Aspects of Colonial Tanzania History

10. The Slave Trade and Slavery in Zanzibar: Opposing Views

10 The Slave Trade and Slavery in Zanzibar: Opposing Views Introduction The origins of the slave trade in East Africa remain shrouded in the mists of history. Likewise, precisely when and why slavery started in Zanzibar remains unclear. According to Ibrahim Shao, slavery predated the arrival of Arabs in Zanzibar. Shao suggests that the traditional ruler of the Hadimu, the Mwinyi Mkuu, and his subordinates “appropriated surplus labour or value products through slavery and tenancy” even though both forms of bondage were not very pronounced.599 Studies by Edward A. Alpers,600 Frederick Cooper601 and Abdul Sheriff,602 emphasize the significance and connections between a new form of slavery and the rise of the Zanzibar Sultanate and the latter’s place in the global capitalist system. This chapter departs from these studies in its emphasis on hitherto neglected aspects of the slave trade and slavery in Zanzibar. The chapter 599 Shao, Ibrahim F. The Political Economy of land Reform in Zanzibar: Before and After the Revolution (Dare-es-Salaam: Dar-es-Salaam University Press, 1992): x. 600 Alpers, Edward A. Ivory and slaves: changing pattern of international trade in East central Africa to the later nineteenth century (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975). 601 Cooper, Frederick, Plantation slavery on the east coast of Africa (Portsmouth, N.H.: Heinemann, 1977, 1997). 602 Sheriff, Abdul, Slaves, spices, & ivory in Zanzibar: integration of an East African commercial empire into the world economy, 1770-1873 (London: J. Currey; Athens: Ohio University Press, 1987). 166 ASPECTS OF COLONIAL TANZANIA HISTORY examines the consequences of the slave trade and slavery on the slaves themselves rather than on their societies or on Zanzibar’s economy. By the early 1870s there were two categories of slaves on Zanzibar Island, namely, those that were domiciled in Zanzibar Town and those who resided in the rural areas. Slaves in Zanzibar Town could be divided into several sub-categories according to their occupations. There were domestic slaves who were mainly women (who worked as cooks, ayahs and concubines), children and eunuchs as well as slaves who were employed in unskilled labor such as porters (popularly known as hamalis) and artisans. Slaves in the rural areas were mainly used in agriculture, especially on largescale clove plantations. The areas where clove production predominated were formerly forested lands which the indigenous Hadimu and Tumbatu people mainly used as common hunting grounds and a source of building materials, and at times to open a new farm locally known as konde. How the Hadimu and Tumbatu ceded these lands to Arab immigrants remains unclear. However, according to Colette Le Cour Grandmaison the Arabs brought with them a sense of private property which was new to the Hadimu and Tumbatu people. Back in Oman permanent rights to water, large estates and substantial homes were incontestable signs of wealth. Therefore, those who had settled in Zanzibar had put to good use the capital accumulated in commerce and the slave trade to build residences and to buy land.603 John Middleton suggests that in some cases the Arabs took plantation lands by superior force, and in others they acquired them by some form of purchase.604 Whatever the facts historically, until the late 1950s the original Arab owners’ rights were accepted as valid. As we shall see in chapter ten, when the Arab landlords began to evict their squatters these rights were questioned by the Afro-Shirazi Party (ASP) leadership who claimed that the Arabs only owned the clove trees but not the land on which they were grown. In the meantime, the lucrative profits from cloves and the need for abundant labor at harvest time caused the plantation owners to accumulate slaves and land.605 However, before we examine the opposing views about the slave trade and slavery in Zanzibar, we must consider what the attitudes of Arab slave masters, plantation managers and overseers in Zanzibar were toward black Africans in general and slaves in particular. Although the Qur’an enjoins Arab Muslims to disregard color in their dealings with other peoples, Arabs were socialized and made color-conscious especially in their dealings with black Africans. Arab folklore denigrated blacks and especially censured interracial sexual liaisons between black men and Arab women. Arab exotic mirabilia is part of the popular ethnology that we find in the collection of stories known in Arabic as Alf Laylah Wa Laylah.606 The ideas and emotions displayed in Alf Laylah Wa Laylah are elemental ones and concern life’s 603 Grandmaison, Colette Le...