paragraph_text: The Protea banks is a reef about 7 km off the shore of South Africa near Margate. the reef lies at a depth of between 27 and 40 meters, being 6km long and 800m wide. Protea Banks is one of the richest tuna grounds in the world, which is one of the main reason why there are so many Zambezi Sharks patrolling the reef. The high tuna population has also enabled generations of fishermen to make a living at Protea. Other fish species that can be observed in the reef include Scalloped Hammerheads, Great Hammerheads and Barracudas. Since its proclamation in 2019, locals are expecting for the Protea banks to bring new economic opportunities, with the expected boom in tourism to the area.

paragraph_text: Adherents of Islam constitute the world's second largest religious group. According to a study in 2015, Islam has 1.8 billion adherents, making up about 24% of the world population. Most Muslims are either of two denominations: Sunni (80 - 90%, roughly 1.5 billion people) or Shia (10 -- 20%, roughly 170 - 340 million people). Islam is the dominant religion in the Central Asia, Indonesia, Middle East, South Asia, North Africa, the Sahel and some other parts of Asia. The diverse Asia - Pacific region contains the highest number of Muslims in the world, easily surpassing the Middle East and North Africa.

paragraph_text: The Republic of the Congo's sparse population is concentrated in the southwestern portion of the country, leaving the vast areas of tropical jungle in the north virtually uninhabited. Thus, Congo is one of the most urbanized countries in Africa, with 70% of its total population living in a few urban areas, namely in Brazzaville, Pointe-Noire or one of the small cities or villages lining the 534-kilometre (332 mi) railway which connects the two cities. In rural areas, industrial and commercial activity has declined rapidly in recent years, leaving rural economies dependent on the government for support and subsistence.

paragraph_text: South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by 2,798 kilometres (1,739 mi) of coastline of Southern Africa stretching along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe; and to the east and northeast by Mozambique and Swaziland (Eswatini); and it surrounds the kingdom of Lesotho. South Africa is the largest country in Southern Africa and the 25th - largest country in the world by land area and, with close to 56 million people, is the world's 24th-most populous nation. It is the southernmost country on the mainland of the Old World or the Eastern Hemisphere. About 80 percent of South Africans are of Sub-Saharan African ancestry, divided among a variety of ethnic groups speaking different African languages, nine of which have official status. The remaining population consists of Africa's largest communities of European (white), Asian (Indian), and multiracial (Coloured) ancestry.

paragraph_text: Africans profess a wide variety of religious beliefs, and statistics on religious affiliation are difficult to come by since they are often a sensitive topic for governments with mixed religious populations. According to the World Book Encyclopedia, Islam is the largest religion in Africa, followed by Christianity. According to Encyclopædia Britannica, 45% of the population are Christians, 40% are Muslims, and 10% follow traditional religions. A small number of Africans are Hindu, Buddhist, Confucianist, Baha'i, or Jewish. There is also a minority of people in Africa who are irreligious.

paragraph_text: West Africa, also called Western Africa and the West of Africa, is the westernmost subregion of Africa. West Africa has been defined as including 18 countries: Benin, Burkina Faso, the island nation of Cape Verde, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea - Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, the island of Saint Helena, Senegal, Sierra Leone, São Tomé and Príncipe and Togo. The population of West Africa is estimated at about 362 million people as of 2016...

paragraph_text: The crisis deepened during the 17th century with the expulsion in 1609 of the Jews and the Moriscos, descendants of the Muslim population that converted to Christianity under threat of exile from Ferdinand and Isabella in 1502. From 1609 through 1614, the Spanish government systematically forced Moriscos to leave the kingdom for Muslim North Africa. They were concentrated in the former Kingdom of Aragon, where they constituted a fifth of the population, and the Valencia area specifically, where they were roughly a third of the total population. The expulsion caused the financial ruin of some of the nobility and the bankruptcy of the Taula de Canvi in 1613. The Crown endeavoured to compensate the nobles, who had lost much of their agricultural labour force; this harmed the economy of the city for generations to come. Later, during the so-called Catalan Revolt (1640–1652), Valencia contributed to the cause of Philip IV with militias and money, resulting in a period of further economic hardship exacerbated by the arrival of troops from other parts of Spain.

paragraph_text: The Muslim population of the region consisted mainly of native Iberian converts to Islam (the so-called Muwallad or Muladi) and to a lesser extent Berbers and Arabs. The Arabs were principally noblemen from Oman; and though few in numbers, they constituted the elite of the population. The Berbers were originally from the Atlas mountains and Rif mountains of North Africa and were essentially nomads. In Portugal, the Muslim population (or "Moors"), relatively small in numbers, stayed in the Algarve region, and south of the Tagus. Today, there are approximately 800 words in the Portuguese language of Arabic origin. The Muslims were expelled from Portugal 300 years earlier than in neighbouring Spain, which is reflected both in Portuguese culture and the language, which is mostly Celtiberian and Vulgar Latin.

paragraph_text: Ludovic-Mohamed Zahed (born 1977) is a French-Algerian imam. An openly gay Muslim, Zahed is the founder of the first European inclusive mosque, in Paris, France, with the goal of accommodating the LGBT and feminist Muslim communities. Zahed has been reported to be the first French Muslim man to be civilly married with another man, in South Africa.

paragraph_text: Modern Egypt is considered to be a regional and middle power, with significant cultural, political, and military influence in North Africa, the Middle East and the Muslim world. Its economy is one of the largest and most diversified in the Middle East, with sectors such as tourism, agriculture, industry and services at almost equal production levels. In 2011, longtime President Hosni Mubarak stepped down amid mass protests. Later elections saw the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood, which was ousted by the army a year later amid mass protests.

paragraph_text: The Voice of the Cape is a Muslim community radio station based in Cape Town, South Africa. The first Muslim radio station in South Africa, the station started broadcasting on a special license in 1995 for the month of Ramadaan. Entirely community-owned and independent, its license is held by the Muslim Broadcasting Corporation.

paragraph_text: In 2010, South Africa began efforts to join the BRIC grouping, and the process for its formal admission began in August of that year. South Africa officially became a member nation on 24 December 2010, after being formally invited by China to join and subsequently accepted by other BRIC countries. The group was renamed BRICS – with the "S" standing for South Africa – to reflect the group's expanded membership. In April 2011, the President of South Africa, Jacob Zuma, attended the 2011 BRICS summit in Sanya, China, as a full member.

paragraph_text: Nigeria is a religiously diverse society, with Islam and Christianity being the most widely professed religions. Nigerians are nearly equally divided into Christians and Muslims, with a tiny minority of adherents of Animism and other religions. According to one recent estimate, over 40% of Nigeria's population adheres to Islam (mainly Sunni, other branches are also present). Christianity is practised by 58% of the population (among them 74% are Protestant, 25% Roman Catholic, 1% other Christian). Adherents of Animism and other religions collectively represent 1.4% of the population.

paragraph_text: This in turn led to the establishment of the right-wing dictatorship of the Estado Novo under António de Oliveira Salazar in 1933. Portugal was one of only five European countries to remain neutral in World War II. From the 1940s to the 1960s, Portugal was a founding member of NATO, OECD and the European Free Trade Association (EFTA). Gradually, new economic development projects and relocation of mainland Portuguese citizens into the overseas provinces in Africa were initiated, with Angola and Mozambique, as the largest and richest overseas territories, being the main targets of those initiatives. These actions were used to affirm Portugal's status as a transcontinental nation and not as a colonial empire.

paragraph_text: The country with the single largest population of Muslims is Indonesia in Southeast Asia, which on its own hosts 13% of the world's Muslims. Together, the Muslims in the countries of the Malay Archipelago (which includes Brunei, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and East Timor) constitute the world's second or third largest population of Muslims. Here Muslims are majorities in each country other than Singapore, the Philippines, and East Timor.

paragraph_text: At the time of the Berlin Conference, Africa contained one-fifth of the world’s population living in one-quarter of the world’s land area. However, from Europe's perspective, they were dividing an unknown continent. European countries established a few coastal colonies in Africa by the mid-nineteenth century, which included Cape Colony (Great Britain), Angola (Portugal), and Algeria (France), but until the late nineteenth century Europe largely traded with free African states without feeling the need for territorial possession. Until the 1880s most of Africa remained unchartered, with western maps from the period generally showing blank spaces for the continent’s interior.

paragraph_text: Whites (mainly of Afrikaner, German, British and Portuguese origin) make up between 4.0 and 7.0% of the population. Although their percentage of population is decreasing due to emigration and lower birth rates they still form the second-largest population of European ancestry, both in terms of percentage and actual numbers, in Sub-Saharan Africa (after South Africa). The majority of Namibian whites and nearly all those who are mixed race speak Afrikaans and share similar origins, culture, and religion as the white and coloured populations of South Africa. A large minority of whites (around 30,000) trace their family origins back to the German settlers who colonized Namibia prior to the British confiscation of German lands after World War One, and they maintain German cultural and educational institutions. Nearly all Portuguese settlers came to the country from the former Portuguese colony of Angola. The 1960 census reported 526,004 persons in what was then South-West Africa, including 73,464 whites (14%).

paragraph_text: According to an autosomal DNA study by Hodgson et al. (2014), the Afro-Asiatic languages were likely spread across Africa and the Near East by an ancestral population(s) carrying a newly identified non-African genetic component, which the researchers dub the "Ethio-Somali". This Ethio-Somali component is today most common among Afro-Asiatic-speaking populations in the Horn of Africa. It reaches a frequency peak among ethnic Somalis, representing the majority of their ancestry. The Ethio-Somali component is most closely related to the Maghrebi non-African genetic component, and is believed to have diverged from all other non-African ancestries at least 23,000 years ago. On this basis, the researchers suggest that the original Ethio-Somali carrying population(s) probably arrived in the pre-agricultural period from the Near East, having crossed over into northeastern Africa via the Sinai Peninsula. The population then likely split into two branches, with one group heading westward toward the Maghreb and the other moving south into the Horn.

paragraph_text: More than 20% of the world's population is Muslim. Current estimates conclude that the number of Muslims in the world is around 1,5 billion. Muslims are the majority in 49 countries, they speak hundreds of languages and come from diverse ethnic backgrounds. Major languages spoken by Muslims include Arabic, Urdu, Bengali, Punjabi, Malay, Javanese, Sundanese, Swahili, Hausa, Fula, Berber, Tuareg, Somali, Albanian, Bosnian, Russian, Turkish, Azeri, Kazakh, Uzbek, Tatar, Persian, Kurdish, Pashto, Balochi, Sindhi and Kashmiri, among many others.

paragraph_text: Region Rank Country 2015 GDP (PPP) millions of International dollars -- Africa 5,736,700 Nigeria 1,192.00 Egypt 995.97 South Africa 724.01 Algeria 570.64 Morocco 274.53 6 Angola 185.25 7 Sudan 167.42 8 Ethiopia 159.22 9 Tanzania 150.4 10 Kenya 143.05 11 Tunisia 127.21 12 Ghana 113.35 13 Libya 92.88 14 Uganda 79.75 15 Ivory Coast 78.34 16 Cameroon 72.11 17 Zambia 64.65 18 Democratic Republic of the Congo 63.27 19 Botswana 37.16 20 Senegal 36.30 21 Madagascar 35.56 22 Gabon 34.41 23 Chad 33.73 24 Mozambique 32.00 25 Burkina Faso 31.18 26 Mali 29.15 27 Zimbabwe 28.90 28 Republic of the Congo 27.92 29 Equatorial Guinea 25.94 30 Mauritius 24.84 31 Namibia 24.51 32 Benin 21.16 33 Malawi 20.56 34 Rwanda 20.32 35 Niger 18.96 36 Mauritania 16.43 37 Guinea 15.28 38 Swaziland 10.87 39 Togo 10.82 40 Eritrea 7.94 41 Burundi 7.88 42 Somalia 5.90 43 Lesotho 5.78 44 Gambia 3.27 45 Liberia 3.78 46 Cape Verde 3.48 47 Djibouti 3.09 48 Seychelles 2.53 49 Guinea - Bissau 1.94 50 Central African Republic 1.62 51 Comoros 1.21 52 São Tomé and Príncipe 0.66

Question: How much of the population of one of the richest countries in Africa is Muslim?
Answer: over 40%