{"id":1839,"date":"2025-04-10T11:25:02","date_gmt":"2025-04-10T11:25:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/?p=1839"},"modified":"2025-04-10T11:25:03","modified_gmt":"2025-04-10T11:25:03","slug":"niger-dumps-french-adopts-hausa-as-official-language","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/2025\/04\/10\/niger-dumps-french-adopts-hausa-as-official-language\/","title":{"rendered":"Niger dumps French, adopts Hausa as official language"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>In a move to further distance itself from its colonial past, the government of Niger has officially adopted the Hausa language as the nation\u2019s national language.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a new charter released last week and published in a special edition of the government\u2019s official journal, the military government announced that the country has dropped French as its official language.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The document declared that henceforth \u201cThe national language is Hausa,\u201d but stated that \u201cthe working languages\u201d remain both English and French.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Prior to the announcement, Hausa had already been the most commonly spoken language across the country, particularly in regions such as Zinder, Maradi, and Tahoua.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According to reports, most of the country\u2019s population of approximately 26 million people understand and speak Hausa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In comparison, only around three million people\u2014just 13 per cent of the entire population\u2014can speak French.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The new charter also officially lists nine other local languages, including Zarma-Songhay, Fula, Kanuri, Gourmanche, and Arabic, as \u201cthe spoken languages of Niger.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><sub><em>Source: Myjoyonline.com<\/em><\/sub> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"500\" src=\"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/IMG-20230613-WA0094.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-562\" style=\"width:135px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/IMG-20230613-WA0094.jpg 500w, https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/IMG-20230613-WA0094-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/IMG-20230613-WA0094-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><strong><em><sub>Dmedia News (Domajuosu Multimedia)<\/sub><\/em><\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a move to further distance itself from its colonial past, the government of Niger<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1840,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1.png",685,424,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1-150x150.png",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1-300x186.png",300,186,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1.png",640,396,false],"large":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1.png",640,396,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1.png",685,424,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1.png",685,424,false],"shareaholic-thumbnail":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1-640x396.png",640,396,true],"chromenews-featured":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1.png",685,424,false],"chromenews-large":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1.png",685,424,false],"chromenews-medium":["https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/image-565-685x424-1-590x410.png",590,410,true]},"author_info":{"info":["Babia Mubaric"]},"category_info":"<a href=\"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/category\/news\/\" rel=\"category tag\">General News<\/a>","tag_info":"General News","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1839"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1841,"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839\/revisions\/1841"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dmediagh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}