Mervyn Lobo is incorrect in equating Zanzibar's formal 'Protectorate' status within the British Empire with that of a 'Colony' when he writes that " ....... which is just a fancy way of saying they ruled through a puppet Sultan." Clearly, the British were dominant in administering Zanzibar through the British 'Resident' (note: not 'Governor") and an Executive Council comprising senior British Civil Servants and representatives of Zanzibar's racially diverse population (though, admittedly, the African majority was clearly significantly under represented). These terms - 'Protectorate' and 'Resident' were not mere differences in description but represented subtle nuanced differences in status and role to other colonies.
Mervyn's description of Zanzibar's Sultan as a "puppet" is also intensely misleading and derogatory. He most definitely was no puppet. Whilst, clearly, the British were dominant in Zanzibar's administration, the British Resident conducted Government in close consultation with His Highness the Sultan in all matters, especially with regard to the role of Islam in Zanzibari society. Increasingly, over the decades of British dominance in Zanzibar - the then Sultan having opted to accept British "protection" upon the seizure of his mainland "possessions" by Britain (Kenya and Uganda) and Germany (Tanganyika) the Sultan's role developed more into one of 'Constitutional Monarch', which was eventually defined in the constitution of the independent State of Zanzibar (December 1963). So, the status and role of Zanzibar's Monarch would have been akin that of Britain's Monarch and no one, I do believe, would describe H. M. Queen Elizabeth as "a puppet", which clearly she is not. I do also believe that one ought to exercise due sensitivity and caution in the descriptions, often inadvisedly, we choose to ascribe to people and posts. In Zanzibar's colonial period, as in many other similar situations, there is a subtle nuanced interplay of roles and influences, which should not be over simplified into dominant and subservient. I would challenged anyone with sufficient knowledge on Zanzibar in colonial times to convince me that the British administration there was capable to taking any action or institute any measure that the Sultan objected to! That therefore is the measure of the Sultan's role and influence, given that a puppet, by definition would have no such power or influence. Mervyn also writes loosely about Zanzibar being "(re-)united with the mainland ..." after independence. The reality is that (The People's Republic of) Zanzibar formed a Union with independent Tanganyika four months after its Revolution. There was no unity with "the mainland" - i.e. with Kenya and Uganda, whose territories were all, at one time, claimed loosely as territories of the Sultan of Zanzibar (then, as it happens, an 'outpost' of Oman). Francis de Lima
