Swahili poised to become the universal language of Africa

More than 60 years after the idea was initially broached, Swahili appears poised to become the language for all of Africa. In the last decade, the African Union, an organization of the continent’s 55 countries, adopted Swahili as an official working language. It has been introduced in classrooms in South Africa and Botswana. In Uganda, the government recently allocated approximately $800 million in its budget for teaching Swahili in its schools. And universities around the continent, most notably in Ghana and Ethiopia, have recently begun teaching the language.Swahili, which has about 200 million speakers and is one of the world’s 10 most popular languages, is the only African language recognized by the Southern African Development Community, a non-governmental organization based in Botswana. Swahili also is the official language of the East African Community, a coalition of eight countries.Kenya is one of the African countries where Swahili is commonly spoken. Here, hundreds of Muslims gather at a mosque for a festival on Lamu Island, Kenya, on October 12, 2023. Hundreds of visitors from across East Africa travel to Lamu, listed under UNESCO as the oldest and best-preserved Swahili settlement in East Africa, to celebrate Maulid, a renown holiday in Islamic calendar...