Flag of Zanzibar Flag of Zanzibar The flag of Zanzibar was adopted on 9 January 2005. It is a horizontal tricolour of blue, black, and green with the national flag of Tanzania in the canton. Zanzibar was a part of the Sultanate of Muscat and Oman, which flew a plain red flag, beginning in 1698. Majid bin Said declared an independent Sultanate of Zanzibar on 2 November 1856 but did not adopt a new flag. The red flag remained in use during the British protectorate period. When Zanzibar gained independence from the United Kingdom on 10 December 1963, a green disk with two
History of Zanzibar Portuguese Empire was the first European power to gain control of Zanzibar, and kept it for nearly 200 years. In 1698, Zanzibar fell under the control of the Sultanate of Oman, which developed an economy of trade and cash crops, with a ruling Arab elite and a Bantu general population. Plantations were developed to grow spices; hence, the moniker of the Spice Islands (a name also used of Dutch colony the Moluccas, now part of Indonesia). Another major trade good was ivory, the tusks of elephants that were killed on the Tanganyika mainland - a practice that is still in