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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tippu_Tib

His mother, Bint Habib bin Bushir, was a Muscat Arab of the ruling class. His father and paternal grandfather were coastal Swahili who had taken part in the earliest trading expeditions to the interior. His paternal great-grandmother, wife of Rajab bin Mohammed bin Said el Murgebi was the daughter of Juma bin Mohammed el Nebhani, a member of a respected Muscat (Oman) family, and an African woman from the village of Mbwa Maji, a small village south of the then German capital of Dar es Salaam.

http://www.bushdrums.com/news/zanzibar.php

Slave and ivory trade (excerpt)

By 1820, at a time when the west coast slave trade was being closed down by European powers, the trade in Zanzibar was still growing. The Nyamwesi had pushed even further west, into the kingdoms of Katanga, Lunda, and Kazembe in modern Zambia and Zaire.

The most famous of the Zanzibar traders was Tippu Tib, a respected Swahili and close confidante of Sultan Majid bin Said. It was he who was largely responsible for the extension of the Sultan’s sphere of influence. Whilst the Sultan managed affairs in Zanzibar, ensuring its security and defending Arab interests from especially British interference, Tippu Tib created a vast empire. Ultimately Said’s African dominions covered a staggering two million square kilometres and it was famously said that “when the flute plays in Zanzibar, the whole of Africa dances”. Many of the native tribes that had been in league with the Arabs for centuries were by now well-armed and Said considered his hold on the continent and the trade to be impregnable...

Tippu Tib, Arab-African or African Arab? Depends on who is writing the story - compare above.