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White African
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White Africans are the white population of Africa. These individuals are mostly of Dutch, British, French, Portuguese, and to a lesser extent Italian, Greek, Belgian, Swiss, Spanish, Irish, and German ancestry. Prior to the decolonisation movements of the post-World War II era, Whites numbered up to 10 million persons and were represented in every part of Africa. However, many left during and after the indigenous independence movements. Nevertheless, White Africans remain an important minority in many African states, for example, 6% of the population in Namibia.
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White Africans are the white population of Africa. These individuals are mostly of Dutch, British, French, Portuguese, and to a lesser extent Italian, Greek, Belgian, Swiss, Spanish, Irish, and German ancestry. Prior to the decolonisation movements of the post-World War II era, Whites numbered up to 10 million persons and were represented in every part of Africa. However, many left during and after the indigenous independence movements. Nevertheless, White Africans remain an important minority in many African states, for example, 6% of the population in Namibia. The African country with the largest White African population is South Africa, at approximately 5.2 million (9.6% of the population). Although Whites no longer rule various African nations, many have remained as permanent residents and often hold a substantial ownership of the economy and land in specific regions or countries. Many North African ethnic groups, such as Arabs and Berbers, can be or are also considered White African under some definitions.
The Dutch in Africa
Dutch settlement, under the Dutch East India Company, began in the Cape of Good Hope (present-day Cape Town) in southern Africa in 1652, making it the oldest European culture in Sub-Saharan Africa. By the late nineteenth century, the descendants of the Dutch (known as Afrikaners) had crossed the Limpopo river into Mashonaland, now part of Zimbabwe. In the early 20th century, following the Anglo-Boer War, large numbers of Afrikaners travelled north to British East Africa and settled in what is now Kenya and Tanzania, as well as in Angola. Following the Mau Mau insurgency and general collapse of colonial authorities in the decades after the World War II, Afrikaner colonies outside South Africa and Namibia diminished in size and the majority of settlers and their descendants returned to South Africa.
The British in Africa
Although there were small British settlements along the West African coast from the 18th century onwards, mostly devoted to the commerce of the slave trade, British settlement in Africa began in earnest only at the end of the 18th century, in the Cape of Good Hope. It gained momentum following British annexation of the Cape from the Dutch East India Company, and the subsequent encouragement of settlers in the Eastern Cape in an effort to consolidate the colony's eastern border.
In the late 19th century, the discovery of gold and diamonds further encouraged colonisation of South Africa by the British. The search for gold drove expansion north into the Rhodesias (now Zimbabwe, Zambia and Malawi). Simultaneously, British settlers began expansion into the fertile uplands (often called the "White Highlands") of British East Africa (now Kenya and Tanzania). Most of these settlements were not planned by the British government, with many colonial officials concluding they upset the balance of power in the region and left overall imperial interests vulnerable. Cecil Rhodes utilized his wealth and connections towards organizing this ad hoc movement and settlement into a grand imperial policy. This policy had as its general aim the securing of a Cairo to Cape Town railway system, and settling the upper highlands of East Africa and the whole of Southern Africa south of the Zambezi with British colonies in a manner akin to that of North America and Australasia.
However, prioritization of British power around the globe in the years before World War I, initially reduced the resources appropriated toward settlement. World War I and the Great Depression and the general decline of British and European birthrates further hobbled the expected settler numbers. Nonetheless, thousands of colonists arrived each year during the decades preceding World War II. Despite a general change in British policy against supporting the establishment of European settlements in Africa, and a slow abandonment in the overall British ruling and common classes for a separate and exclusivist European identity, large colonial appendages of European separatist supporters of the British Empire were well entrenched in South Africa, Rhodesia, and Kenya.
In keeping with the general trend toward non-European rule evident throughout most of the globe during the Cold War and the abandonment of colonial positions in the face of American and Soviet pressure, the vestigial remnants of Cecil Rhodes' vision was abruptly ended, leaving British settlers in an exposed, isolated and weak position. Black Nationalist guerrilla forces aided by Soviet expertise and weapons soon drove the colonists into a fortress mentality which led to the break-off of ties with perceived collaborationist governments in the United Kingdom and Commonwealth. The result was a series of conflicts which eventually led to a reduced presence of White Africans due to emigration and natural death. Many were murdered, tens of thousands driven off their lands and property, with many of those remaining being intimidated and threatened by the government and political and paramilitary organisations.
In 1964, there were 70,000 Europeans in Zambia. There were 60,000 white settlers living in Kenya in 1965. Today, there are an estimated 30,000 whites in Kenya. However, there has been an increasing number of British expatriates that, according to the BBC, number at about 32,000. The white population in Zimbabwe dropped from a peak of around 296,000 in 1975 to possibly 120,000 in 1999 and was estimated at no more than 50,000 in 2002, possibly much less.
Sizeable numbers of Anglo-Africans also live in Ghana, Namibia, Tanzania, Uganda, Swaziland (3% of the population), Nigeria and Botswana.
The French in Africa
- See also Huguenots in South Africa, French rule in Algeria, Pieds noirs, Franco-Réunionnaise, Franco-Mauritian, and Franco-Seychellois
Large numbers of French people settled in French North Africa from the 1840s onwards. By the end of French rule in the early 1960s there were over one million French Algerians of European origin (known as pieds noirs, or "black feet") living in Algeria. There were 255,000 Europeans in Tunisia in 1956. Morocco was home to half a million Europeans.
No other region of the French African colonial empire attracted similar settlement, although there is still a comparatively large European population living in the former West African colony of Senegal, which has largest French African population in sub-Saharan Africa. There is also an important white minority in Gabon, Côte d'Ivoire, and Togo. The total French population in Côte d'Ivoire was 60,000 in 1980. An estimated 18,000 French citizens lived and worked in Madagascar in the early 1990s (by independence, the Madagascar’s colons accounted for 70,000 people).
French law made it easy for thousands of colons, ethnic or national French from former colonies of Africa, India and Indochina to live in mainland France. 1.6 million European colons migrated from Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco.
In Réunion, a French island in the Indian Ocean, white islanders of French origin make up approx. 25% of the population.
A large number of French Huguenots settled in the Cape Colony, following their expulsion from France in the 17th century. However, the use of the French language was banned and the Huguenot settlers were entirely absorbed into Afrikaans culture. However, this early contact can be seen clearly in the names of historic towns, such as Franschhoek in the Western Cape (meaning "French Corner") and in the surnames of many Afrikaners, such as Theron, Du Plessis etc.
The Portuguese in Africa
The first Portuguese settlements in Africa were built in the 15th century. In the late 17th century, much of Portuguese Mozambique was divided into prazos, or agricultural estates, which were settled by Portuguese families. In Portuguese Angola, namely in the areas of Luanda and Benguela there was significant Portuguese population. In the islands of Cape Verde and São Tomé and Príncipe, besides Portuguese settlers, most of the population was of mixed Portuguese and African origin.
In the early 20th century, the Portuguese government encouraged white emigration to Angola and Mozambique, and by the 1960s, at the beginning of the Portuguese Colonial War, there were around 650,000 Portuguese settlers living in their overseas African provinces, and a substantial Portuguese population living in other African countries. In 1974, there were up to 1,000,000 Portuguese settlers living in their overseas African provinces. In 1975, Angola had a community of approximately 500,000 Portuguese.
Most Portuguese settlers returned to Portugal (the retornados) as the country's African possessions gained independence in the mid 1970s, while others moved south to South Africa, which now has the largest Portuguese-African population.
Other White African Groups
Smaller White African groups also settled parts of Africa. These include Spanish in Equatorial Guinea, Western Sahara, Morocco, Ceuta, Melilla (94,000 Spaniards chose to go to the Algeria in the last years of the 19th century, 250,000 Spaniards lived in Morocco at the beginning of the 20th century), and South Africa; Italians in Libya, Eritrea, eastern Somalia, and South Africa; Germans in Namibia and South Africa; and Belgians in Democratic Republic of Congo and South Africa, and Lithuanians in South Africa; and Lebanese in South Africa, Senegal, Liberia, Nigeria, Congo, and Côte d'Ivoire.
In 1926, there were 90,000 Italians in Tunisia, compared to 70,000 Frenchmen. Former Italian communities once thrived in their African colonies of Eritrea (50,000 Italian settlers in 1935), Somalia (in the first half of 1940, there were 22,000 Italians living in Somalia, of whom 10,000 in the capital Mogadishu) and Libya (some 150,000 Italians settled in Libya, constituting about 18% of the total population).
All of Libya's Italians were expelled from the North African country in 1970, a year after Muammar al-Gaddafi seized power (a "day of vengeance" on 7 October 1970). The Italian Eritreans grew from 4,000 during World War I to nearly 100,000 at the beginning of World War II. There was emigration to Ethiopia as well. During the five-year occupation of Ethiopia, roughly 300,000 Italians were absorbed into East Africa (there were over 49,000 Italians living in Asmara in 1939, and over 38,000 in Addis Ababa). But fully one third of these Italians were military.
In 1948, approximately 600,000 Jews lived in North Africa; today only around 6,000 Jews remain. There is a substantial, mostly Ashkenazic Jewish community in South Africa. These Jews arrived mostly from Lithuania prior to World War II. Although the Jewish community peaked in the 1970s, about 80,000 remain in South Africa.
Armenians and Greeks once numbered thousands in Ethiopia and Sudan, before civil wars, revolutions and nationalization drove most of them out. They still have community centers and churches in these countries.
The Greek community in South Africa numbers around 60,000 people. The Greeks had a thriving presence in Egypt from the ancient times up to today. In about 1940, Greeks were numbered at about 250,000. The exodus of Greeks from Egypt started during and after the revolution of 1952. It is estimated that between 1957 - 1962 almost 70% of the Egyptian Greeks left the country. Today, there is almost 3,000 Greeks left in Egypt, however it's likely to be higher because many Greeks have changed their Nationality to Egyptian. The size of the Italian Egyptian community had reached around 55,000 just before World War II, forming the second largest expatriate community in Egypt. Before 1952 there were around 75,000 Armenians in Egypt.
On 5 July 1960, five days after the Congo gained independence from Belgium, the Force Publique garrison near Léopoldville mutinied against its white officers and attacked numerous European targets. This caused the fear amongst the approximately 100,000 whites still resident in the Congo and mass exodus from the country. In 1965, there were 60,000 Belgians spread throughout the Congo.
The inhabitants of the Canary Islands hold a gene pool that is halfway between the Spaniards and the ancient native population, the Guanches (a proto-berber population), although with a major Spanish contribution. An estimated 90,000 Spaniards live in Spain's North African enclaves Ceuta and Melilla.
On Tristan da Cunha, the population of 271 people shared just seven surnames: Glass, Green, Hagan, Lavarello (a typical Ligurian surname), Repetto (another typical Ligurian surname), Rogers and Swain.
There are an estimated 100,000 Europeans living in Tunisia. Morocco has about 100,000 Europeans, most of them French. About 50,000 Europeans (mostly French) and Lebanese reside in Senegal, mainly in the cities.
Current Populations (2005 est. From CIA)
White African Population by Country
- South Africa: 5,265,300 (as of July 2008)
- Namibia: 124,000 - 150,000
- Mozambique: 30,000
- Angola: 7,000 - 40,000
- Zambia: 8,000 - 120,000
- Zimbabwe: 22,000
- Senegal: 50,000
- Botswana: 7,000 - 50,000
- Kenya: 30,000 - 62,000
- Other African nations: 300,000
The White African population of Zimbabwe was much higher in the 1960s and 1970s (when the country was known as Rhodesia), when it was 300,000 at its highest. After the introduction of majority rule in 1980, and the downturn due to a new economic system during the late 1990s that was brought on by expulsion of white farmers and the economic mismanagement by the Mugabe regime, many white people left the country.
By September 2007, it is thought that as few as 22,000 whites remain in Zimbabwe as the economic and political crisis deepens. It is thought that if economic and political conditions better, some of the former white population will return.
The white African population in Mozambique was at its peak with about 370,000 Portuguese-Mozambicans residing in Mozambique during the 1970's but political crisis and violence drastically decreased its population in a matter of weeks. Most Portuguese-Mozambicans expelled to Portugal and to neighboring South Africa and Zimbabwe. However, there has been an increase in the white African population of Mozambique in the last 5 years due to the immense Brazilian presence in Mozambique.
Languages
White Africans generally speak European languages as their first languages (English, Portuguese, French, German, Spanish, Italian and Afrikaans, derived from Dutch); some also speak major native African languages.
Sports
White Africans in East and Southern Africa are largely of British descent hence the most popular sport with them is cricket. Rugby and hockey are also popular with them. Today, Cricket, rugby and hockey national sports teams of South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, and Kenya and until the 1970s, East African teams have been composed primarily of whites.
Many Whites from Commonwealth countries in Africa are accomplished swimmers, including Kirsty Coventry of Zimbabwe and Jason Dunford of Kenya, as well as numerous South Africans.
See also
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