President of Zanzibar President of Zanzibar The President of Zanzibar is the head of the Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar, which is a semi-autonomous government within Tanzania. The current President is Ali Mohamed Shein. The President is also the chairman of the Revolutionary Council, whose members are appointed by the President, and some of which must be selected from the House of Representatives. The President is elected by a plurality. Presidential terms are for five years, and a candidate may be re-elected only once. Following the Zanzibar Revolution in 1964, Abeid Karume became the first President of Zanzibar, as leader of the Afro-Shirazi Party.
Sultanate of Zanzibar Sultanate of Zanzibar The Sultanate of Zanzibar (, ), also known as the Zanzibar Sultanate, comprised the territories over which the Sultan of Zanzibar was the sovereign. Those territories varied over time, and at one point included all of what is now Kenya as well as the Zanzibar Archipelago of the Swahili Coast. Later, the kingdom's realm included only a ten mile wide coastal strip of Kenya and Zanzibar. Under an agreement concluded on 8 October 1963, the Sultan relinquished sovereignty over his remaining territory in Kenya. On 12 January 1964, Sultan Jamshid bin Abdullah was deposed and lost sovereignty