Religion in Tanzania
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Current statistics on religion in Tanzania are unavailable because religious surveys were eliminated from government census reports after 1967.[1] Religious leaders and sociologists estimate that the Christian and Muslim communities are approximately equal in size, each accounting for 30 to 40 percent of the population, with the remainder consisting of practitioners of other faiths, indigenous religions, and atheists.[1]
Ninety-nine percent of the population on the Zanzibar archipelago is Muslim.[1] On the mainland, Muslim communities are concentrated in coastal areas, with some large Muslim minorities also in inland urban areas.[1] Between 80 and 90 percent of the country's Muslim population is Sunni; the remainder consists of several Shi'a subgroups, mostly of Asian descent.[1] The Christian population is composed of Roman Catholics, Protestants, Pentecostals, New Apostolic Christians, Seventh-day Adventists, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), and members of Jehovah's Witnesses.[1]
Foreign missionaries operate in the country.[1]
The Constitution provides for freedom of religion, and the Government generally respects this right in practice.[1] Tensions between Muslims and Christians in Tanzania are high.[1] There have been cases of increased tension between secular and fundamentalist Muslims as the latter have called for Muslims to adopt a stricter interpretation of Islam in their daily lives.[1]
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- ^ a b c d e f g h i j International Religious Freedom Report 2007: Tanzania. United States Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (September 14, 2007). This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
