Union Day

Union Day marks the union of two sovereign postcolonial states: the Republic of Tanganyika and the People's Republic of Zanzibar. Julius Nyerere and Abeid Karume signed the Articles of Union in Zanzibar on April 22, 1964; the partners ratified them and the Union took effect on April 26. The name Tanzania was adopted later that year. Zanzibar did not disappear: it retained its own President, House of Representatives and government for non-Union matters within a two-government constitutional structure.

Official accounts stress Pan-Africanism, geography, Kiswahili and pre-existing movement between the mainland and islands. The Union is also a continuing constitutional settlement debated over the scope of Union matters, revenue, autonomy, representation and possible governmental structures. A nuanced guide records both durability and disagreement rather than describing every Tanzanian as holding one view of the arrangement.

The Public Holidays Act, Cap. 35 R.E. 2023, places this holiday in the Union schedule and permits the President to add or substitute dates by proclamation. Unlike older editions still reproduced online, the current Act contains no automatic Saturday-or-Sunday replacement section; its 2026 calendar therefore supplies no Monday substitute for a weekend date. A department head may require public servants to work. On the mainland section 26 of the Employment and Labour Relations Act requires double basic-wage pay for holiday hours worked; Zanzibar employment is separately governed by section 67 of its 2005 Act, which provides a full-pay holiday or the specified compensatory-day/double-pay treatment.