Background
In late 1884 an expedition of the Society for German Colonization led by Karl Peters had reached Zanzibar and made the local chiefs on the opposite mainland sign "protection contracts" promising vast areas to his organisation. Once it had gained a foothold, Peters' newly established German East Africa Company acquired further lands in Tanganyika up to the Uluguru and Usambara Mountains. This met with opposition by Sultan Barghash bin Said of Zanzibar, who nevertheless had to give in, after Peters had reached the official support by the Foreign Office in Berlin and a fleet of the Kaiserliche Marine under Konteradmiral Eduard Knorr appeared off the Zanzibar coast. On 28 April 1888 Sultan Khalifah bin Said of Zanzibar finally signed a treaty according to which he ceded the administration of the Tanganyika mainland to the German East Africa Company.
From August 1888 the organisation tried to take over the coastal towns of Tanganyika against the fierce resistance by the Arab elite fearing for the slave and ivory trade, but also by the indigenous population. The attempts by haughty Emil von Zelewski, German administrator in Pangani, to raise the company's flag over the city, sparked the uprising.
Read more about this topic: Abushiri Revolt
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