Last month, the United Nations celebrated the third annual World Kiswahili Day with events worldwide and a speech by UNESCO director-general Audrey Azoulay, who concluded with the following plea:
“We need more amani, and therefore more Kiswahili.
“This aligns also with UNESCO’s global priority for Africa.
“Because, in addition to being spoken across dozens of African countries, Kiswahili is one of the African Union’s official languages—which makes it a powerful tool for cooperation in achieving ‘the Africa We Want.’
“And as part of our global priority for Africa, we stand alongside the African Union in working toward this goal.
“Especially with 2024 being declared the African Union’s Year of Education.
“Drawing notably on the conclusions of our Futures of Education initiative, we will continue our efforts—not only at the normative level, but also on the ground, in close coordination with member states, education systems, university professors, teachers, and civil society representatives.
“Today, we are not only celebrating a language but also a link—the link created between millions of people, between generations, and between different places and times.
“We are celebrating a language that tells us of history, of geography.
“Above all, we are celebrating peace through Kiswahili, a language of encounters and exchanges. “I therefore welcome you all to UNESCO House today—to celebrate this vector of peace, of transmission, across the African continent and beyond. “I’ll conclude with some words from this beautiful language: Kiswahili ni lugha ya amani. ‘Kiswahili is the language of peace.’”
Kiswahili is one of the most widely used languages of the African family and the most widely spoken in sub-Saharan Africa. It is among the ten most widely spoken languages in the world, with more than 200 million speakers. The language is one of the lingua francas in many countries within East, Central, and Southern Africa as well as in the Middle East. It is also taught across major universities and colleges globally.
