Description

Tanzania is a country located in East Africa and bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi and the Congo to the west, Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique to the south and the Indian Ocean to the east. Tanzania is the world's 31st largest country in the world. The land in this country is mountainous in the northeast. This is where Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa's highest peak, at 5,895 feet is located. In the north and west, the Great Lakes of Lake Victoria and Lake Tanganyika are located. In Central Tanzania, there is a large plateau with plains and arable land. Tanzania contains many large and ecologically significant wildlife parks including: Ngorongoro Crater, Serengeti National Park and Gombe National Park.
 
Tanzania's president and National Assembly members are elected concurrently by direct popular vote. The prime minister is appointed by the president and serves as the government's leader in the National Assembly. The president selects his cabinet from among National Assembly members. The National Assembly is unicameral and contains 295 members. The House of Representatives has jurisdiction over all non-union matters and there are currently seventy-six members. The country consists of a five-level judiciary combing the jurisdictions of tribal, Islamic, and British common law.
 
In Tanzania, there is no official language by law, but by practice the official national language is Swahili and is used for inter tribal communication and for official matters. A popular type of music is Taarab music, which is a fusion of pre-Islamic Swahili tunes sung in a rhythmic poetic style, mixed with general Islamic melodies. This form of music forms a major part of the social life of the Swahili people along the coastal areas of Tanzania. Today, there is a taarab revolution and many heated debates continue about the music because it has been drastically changed by the East African Melody phenomenon. The music has become much more explicit and even more graphic.

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