60 Fun Facts About Comoros

What is the capital and largest city of the Comoros?

It sits on the west coast of Grande Comore, and its name means 'at the river' in the local Shingazidja language.

In which year did the Comoros proclaim independence from France?

The Comorian parliament declared independence unilaterally on 6 July; France did not recognise the new state until 31 December.

Alongside Comorian and French, which language is official in the Comoros?

It is the language of Quranic teaching, and more Comorians are literate in the Arabic script than in the Latin one.

The Comoros is the only member of which organisation to lie entirely in the Southern Hemisphere?

It is also a member of the African Union, the Francophonie, the OIC and the Indian Ocean Commission.

The Comoros is Africa's third-smallest country by area, behind São Tomé and Príncipe and which other?

At 1,659 square kilometres the whole country is smaller than Greater London, yet it is one of the most densely populated on Earth.

The name 'Comoros' comes from Jazr al-Qumr, a phrase meaning what?

Jazr al-Qumr may originally have referred to a vaguer southern region where Arab sailors saw the Magellanic Clouds.

The Comoros sits at the northern end of which body of water?

The islands lie between the coast of Mozambique and Tanzania and the northern tip of Madagascar, and have no land borders.

Which island of the Comoro archipelago voted against independence and is still administered by France?

It became a full French overseas department in 2011, though the Comoros still claims it with backing from the African Union and UN.

Which active shield volcano is the highest point of the Comoros?

It is one of the most active volcanoes in the world, having erupted more than 20 times since the 19th century.

How tall is the highest point of the Comoros?

Its 3 km by 4 km summit caldera has been shaped by frequent eruptions, though the island has largely escaped broad destruction.

Since independence, roughly how many coups or attempted coups has the Comoros experienced?

Several heads of state were assassinated along the way, and the 1999 takeover by Azali Assoumani was counted as the 18th.

The Comoros is the world's largest producer of which perfume-industry plant?

The essential oil is distilled from the flowers of Cananga odorata, a tree that was introduced to the islands under French rule.

Roughly what share of the world's supply of the perfume plant Cananga odorata comes from the Comoros?

Vanilla, cinnamon and cloves round out an export economy that is hostage to world commodity prices.

Which 'living fossil' fish, thought extinct for 66 million years, was found off the Comoros in December 1952?

The species had first turned up in 1938 off South Africa; 84 specimens were caught and recorded between 1938 and 1975.

The Comoros national football team is nicknamed after which animal?

Les Coelacantes only became a FIFA member in 2005 and reached their first Africa Cup of Nations in 2021.

At the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations, the Comoros pulled off a shock 3-2 group win over which nation?

Ahmed Mogni scored twice, and the BBC called it one of the biggest shocks in Nations Cup history.

Who proclaimed Comorian independence in 1975 and became the country's first president?

He lasted less than a month before being ousted in a coup, then returned in 1978 and ruled until his assassination in 1989.

Which French mercenary, the 'Viceroy of the Comoros', joined four coup attempts there?

He ran the presidential guard with South African money and was finally forced to surrender to French paratroopers in 1995.

Which Comorian president, a socialist revolutionary, renounced Islam and became an atheist?

He was toppled by a French-backed coup on 13 May 1978 and killed a few weeks later.

The December 2001 accords signed by all three islands' leaders renamed the country what?

The deal made each island highly autonomous, with its own president, and rotated the Union presidency between the islands.

How many horizontal stripes does the Comorian flag have?

One stripe per island, including the French-run one the country still claims, plus a green triangle bearing a crescent and stars.

The green triangle, crescent and stars on the Comorian flag symbolise what?

The crescent-and-four-stars motif has been used in various forms since the independence movement of 1975.

Which is the largest island in the Comoros?

Known locally as Ngazidja, it covers 1,024 square kilometres and, being the youngest island, has rocky soil and few good harbours.

By what name was the island of Anjouan known to English speakers until the early twentieth century?

It served as a way station for English merchants bound for India and for American whalers before the Suez Canal opened.

Which town is the capital of the smallest of the three main islands?

The island seceded from the Comoros in August 1997, a week after Anjouan, and rejoined in 1998.

Up to roughly how much can an ada, or grand marriage, cost on the largest island?

The two-week celebration marks a man's passage to elder status; many couples save for a lifetime and their adult children attend.

Twarab, the Comoros' most influential music genre, was imported from where in the early 1900s?

It remains the soundtrack of grand-marriage celebrations across the islands.

Livingstone's fruit bat, the largest and rarest bat in the Comoros, has a wingspan of up to how much?

It weighs up to 800 grams, lives only on two of the islands, and unlike most bats it can soar on daytime thermals.

How old was Bahia Bakari, the sole survivor of the 2009 Yemenia Flight 626 crash off the Comoros?

She was found clinging to wreckage in the Indian Ocean; 152 others died in the country's deadliest aviation disaster.

Yemenia Flight 626, which crashed on approach to the Comoros in 2009, had departed from which city?

The Airbus A310 stalled during a go-around after the crew, overloaded and undertrained, let the automation drop the thrust to idle.

President Sambi, elected in 2006, earned the nickname 'Ayatollah' for studying Islam in which country?

His 2006 election marked the first peaceful, democratic transfer of power in Comorian history.

Where was Anjouan rebel leader Mohammed Bacar eventually granted asylum after 2008?

He had fled the island in a speedboat after refusing to step down when his mandate ended.

How many national parks does the Comoros have?

Three are marine parks protecting reefs, two cover the highest peaks, and Mohéli National Park is both land and sea.

How many people were evacuated during the April 2005 eruption of the Karthala volcano?

The eruption destroyed the crater lake that had filled the caldera since 1991.

In 933, Omani sailors referred to the Comoros by what name?

The islands became a hub of the Swahili trading network alongside Kilwa, Sofala and Mombasa.

Which explorer's second fleet made the first Portuguese visit to the Comoros in 1503?

For much of the 16th century the islands supplied the Portuguese fort at Mozambique, but Portugal never formally claimed them.

Which single crop accounted for about 65% of Comorian exports in 2023?

Agriculture as a whole still made up over a third of GDP in 2024 and employed more than half the workforce.

Roughly what is the population of the Comoros?

It is one of the least populous countries in the world yet packs about 457 people into every square kilometre.

Sunni Islam is followed by roughly what share of the Comorian population?

It is the only Muslim-majority country in Southern Africa, and Islam is the official state religion.

Al-Watwan, one of the country's two daily newspapers, is owned by whom?

The privately owned La Gazette des Comores is the other daily; both are published in the capital.

The Comorian dish mshakiki is what?

It closely resembles the mishkaki eaten along the Kenyan and Tanzanian coast.

Langouste à la vanille, a French-influenced Comorian dish, pairs vanilla sauce with what?

The French-influenced dish is a newer arrival next to older staples such as fish simmered in coconut milk with plantains.

Msindzano, the paste many Comorian women apply to their faces, is made from ground coral and what?

Traditional dress varies by island: red-and-white shiromani cloths on Anjouan, colourful leso shawls elsewhere.

The Badjanani Mosque in the Comorian capital was built in which year?

It dates from the golden age of the Swahili trading cities, when the town was one of two power centres of the kingdom of Bambao.

The Comoros became which numbered member of the United Nations in November 1975?

The UN defined the new state as the whole archipelago, even though the people of the fourth island had chosen to remain French.

Remittances from the Comorian diaspora made up roughly what share of GDP in 2023?

Between 200,000 and 350,000 Comorians live in France, and the money they send home has helped cut poverty.

Ikililou Dhoinine, inaugurated in 2011, was the first Comorian president from which island?

The rotating presidency introduced by the Fomboni Accords finally gave the smallest island its turn.

In which year did the Comoros join the World Trade Organization?

The same year saw President Azali Assoumani re-elected in a disputed vote with 63%.

The kashkazi, which runs from November to April, is which part of the Comorian year?

The name means 'north monsoon'; the cooler, dry kusi or south monsoon takes over from May to October.

Which owl is found only on the slopes of the Comoros' great volcano?

It shares that tiny range with the Grand Comoro drongo, Humblot's flycatcher and the Karthala white-eye.

The first attested inhabitants of the Comoros are thought to have arrived by boat from where?

They arrived no later than the eighth century, and Bantu speakers from East Africa were present from the very start of settlement.

Legend says the islanders' emissary Mtswa-Mwindza reached which city in 632, just after Muhammad died?

He is said to have returned to build a mosque in his home town of Ntsaweni and to have led the islanders' gradual conversion.

After the 1995 mercenary coup, France flew President Djohar to which island for 'treatment'?

He was kept away until January 1996, then restored to office briefly by the French Operation Azalee before losing the election.

The country's largest patch of vanishing rainforest is found where?

The forest is threatened by logging and farming, and Karthala National Park was created in 2010 to protect 262 square kilometres of it.

Which army chief of staff seized power in a bloodless coup in April 1999?

He returned to the presidency in 2016 and pushed through a 2018 referendum allowing a president to serve two terms.

In which year did the Comoros assume the rotating presidency of the African Union?

The same year the country was invited as a non-member guest to the G7 summit in Hiroshima.

Mutsamudu is the capital of which Comorian island?

The island has a distinctive triangular shape formed by three mountain chains radiating from a central peak.

Which peak, 1,575 metres high, is the central summit of the country's triangular island?

The three mountain chains that give the island its triangular shape are named Shisiwani, Nioumakele and Jimilime.

In 2021 the Comoros signed and ratified a treaty prohibiting what?

The move made the archipelago a formally nuclear-weapon-free state.

France first took possession of Mayotte in 1841 by treaty with a usurper sultan from which people?

Andriantsoly, also called Tsy Levalo, ceded the island; France then tried to turn it into a sugar plantation colony.