{{Short description|Meta-ethnic group located in Somalia}} {{expert needed|1=Ethnic groups|talk=Somali Propaganda|date=June 2020}} {{Use dmy dates|date=June 2020}} {{Infobox ethnic group | group = | total = '''1,100,000''' (2012)<ref name="Tanzacc">{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3020110.stm |title=Tanzania accepts Somali Bantus |work=BBC News |date=25 June 2003 |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.refworld.org/publisher,MRGI,COUNTRYPROF,SOM,4954ce42c,0.html | title=Refworld | World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Somalia }}</ref>'''–1,500,000''' (2025)<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.euaa.europa.eu/coi/somalia/2025/country-focus/14-minorities/142-ethnic-minorities|title=EUAA Ethnic minorities in Somalia|publisher=European Union Agency for Asylum|access-date=May 24, 2026}}</ref> | regions = Southern Somalia, Kenya, and Tanzania |region1 = {{flagcountry|Somalia}} |pop1 = 1,100,000 (2011)<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.refworld.org/publisher,MRGI,COUNTRYPROF,SOM,4954ce42c,0.html | title=Refworld | World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Somalia }}</ref>–1,500,000 (2025)<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.euaa.europa.eu/coi/somalia/2025/country-focus/14-minorities/142-ethnic-minorities|title=EUAA Ethnic minorities in Somalia|publisher=European Union Agency for Asylum|access-date=May 24, 2026}}</ref> | region2 = {{flagcountry|Tanzania}} | pop2 = 3,000 (2011)<ref name="Tanzacc" /> |region3 ={{flagcountry|Kenya}} |pop3 = 685 (2019)<ref>{{Cite web | url=https://www.knbs.or.ke/?wpdmpro=2019-kenya-population-and-housing-census-volume-iv-distribution-of-population-by-socio-economic-characteristics&wpdmdl=5730&ind=7HRl6KateNzKXCJaxxaHSh1qe6C1M6VHznmVmKGBKgO5qIMXjby1XHM2u_swXdiR|title=2019 Kenya Population and Housing Census Volume IV: Distribution of Population by Socio-Economic Characteristics|date=December 2019 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230105144514/https://www.knbs.or.ke/?wpdmpro=2019-kenya-population-and-housing-census-volume-iv-distribution-of-population-by-socio-economic-characteristics&wpdmdl=5730&ind=7HRl6KateNzKXCJaxxaHSh1qe6C1M6VHznmVmKGBKgO5qIMXjby1XHM2u_swXdiR | archive-date=2023-01-05}}</ref> | religions = Islam<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://somalibantumaine.org/somali-bantu-background/|title = Somali Bantu History}}</ref> | languages = Mushunguli, Swahili, other Bantu languages, and Somali primarily the Maay dialect (<small>through acculturation and ongoing language shift</small>) | related_groups = Other Bantus, especially Zigua, Ngulu, Swahili | native_name = | native_name_lang = }} The '''Somali Bantus''' (also known as '''Jareerweyne''' or '''Gosha''') are a Bantu ethnic minority group in Somalia who primarily reside in the southern part of the country, primarily near the Jubba and Shabelle rivers. The Somali Bantus are descendants of enslaved peoples from various Bantu ethnic groups from Southeast Africa, particularly from Mozambique, Malawi, and Tanzania.<ref name="Refugee Reports"/><ref name="Gcam"/> The East African slave trade was not eliminated until the early parts of the 20th century.
Somali Bantus are not ancestrally related to the indigenous ethnic Somalis of Cushitic background and have a culture distinct from the ethnic Somalis. The Somali Bantu have remained marginalized ever since the establishment of Somalia.<ref>L. Randol Barker et al., ''Principles of Ambulatory Medicine'', 7 edition, (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins: 2006), p.633</ref> Some Somali Bantu people have been displaced into Kenya, and a small number have returned to Tanzania.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://ethnomed.org/culture/somali-bantu/somali-bantu-refugees|title=Somali Bantu Refugees — EthnoMed|website=ethnomed.org|access-date=2019-12-08}}</ref> An overseas diaspora community of Somali Bantus can be found primarily in the United States.<ref name=":1" />
Cultural assimilation into mainstream Somali society tends to be stronger for Somali Bantus living in urban areas and the Shebelle region, while Bantu linguistic and cultural traditions tend to be stronger in Somali Bantus of the Juba region.<ref name=":2" /> Politically, the Somali Bantu of different tribes form ethnic alliances in the parliament of Somalia.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Eno|first=Mohamed A.|title=The Bantu-Jareer Somalis : unearthing apartheid in the Horn of Africa|date=2008|publisher=Adonis & Abbey Publishers|isbn=978-1-905068-95-1|location=London, UK|oclc=638660234}}</ref>
The Somali Bantu are not to be confused with the members of Swahili society of Somalia in coastal centers, such as the Bajuni or the Bravanese, who speak dialects of the Swahili language but have a culture, tradition, and history separate of the Somali Bantu.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Banafunzi|first=Bana M.S.|date=October 1996|title=The Education of the Bravanese Community. Key issues of culture and identity|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0305569960220303|journal=Educational Studies|volume=22|issue=3|pages=331–342|doi=10.1080/0305569960220303|issn=0305-5698|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|author=Bujra, Janet M.|title=An anthropological study of political action in a Bajuni village in Kenya.|oclc=1079281283}}</ref>
The number of Somali Bantu in Somalia is estimated to be around 1,000,000 to 1,500,000 persons and is mainly concentrated in the south, but they can be found in urban areas throughout the country.<ref name="Tanzacc" /> Although ref world minority rights website cites a figure of 1 million Somali Bantus in Somalia who made up 15% of the population in an article published in 2011 and taken from the UN's Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN) in 2010.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.refworld.org/publisher,MRGI,COUNTRYPROF,SOM,4954ce42c,0.html | title=Refworld | World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Somalia }}</ref>
==Terminology== [[File:Somalia farmers.jpg|thumb|Bantu farmers near Kismayo]] Various terms differentiating the Somali Bantu from ethnic Somalis have been in usage for a long time. However, the term "Somali Bantu" in specific is an ethnonym that was created by humanitarian agencies shortly after the outbreak of the civil war in Somalia in 1991. Its purpose was to help staff of these aid agencies better distinguish between, on the one hand, Bantu origin ethnic minority groups hailing from Southern Somalia and thus in dire need of humanitarian attention and on the other hand, versus other Bantu groups from elsewhere in Africa that did not require immediate humanitarian assistance. The neologism further spread through the media, which repeated verbatim what the aid agencies' increasingly began indicating in their reports as a new name for Somalia's ethnically Bantu minorities. Prior to the civil war, the Bantu were referred to in the literature as ''Bantu'', ''Gosha'', ''Mushunguli'', ''Oggi'' and especially as ''Jareer'', which they still, in fact, are within Somalia proper.<ref name="Menkhaus">[http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/ethio_0066-2127_2003_num_19_1_1051 Bantu ethnic identities in Somalia]</ref>
==History==
===Origin=== {{Main|Bantu peoples|Bantu expansion}} thumb|Map showing the ancestral roots of the Somali Bantu peoples Between 2500–3000 years ago, speakers of the original proto-Bantu language group began a millennia-long series of migrations eastward from their original homeland in the general Nigeria and Cameroon area of West Africa.<ref>Philip J. Adler, Randall L. Pouwels, ''World Civilizations: To 1700 Volume 1 of World Civilizations'', (Cengage Learning: 2007), p.169.</ref> This Bantu expansion first introduced Bantu peoples to central, southern and southeastern Africa, regions where they had previously been absent from.<ref name="UNHCR"/><ref name="Falola">Toyin Falola, Aribidesi Adisa Usman, ''Movements, borders, and identities in Africa'', (University Rochester Press: 2009), p.4.</ref>
The Somali Bantu largely trace their origins from the Somali slave trade (sometimes also referred to as the 'Arab' or 'Indian Ocean' slave trade).<ref>{{Cite book|author=Besteman, Catherine|title=Unraveling Somalia : Race, Class, and the Legacy of Slavery|oclc=1248695570}}</ref> This was a centuries long trade which brought Southeast African populations to Somalia and other parts of the Arab world.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Murray.|first=Gordon|title=Slavery in the Arab World.|date=1998|publisher=New Amsterdam Books|isbn=978-1-4616-3625-0|oclc=850193692}}</ref> Marginalized Black African ethnic minorities with an ethnogenesis in slavery can be found in nearby countries such as the Al Akhdam ethnic minority in Yemen paralleling social dynamics in Somalia.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Seif|first=Huda|date=2005-01-02|title=The Accursed Minority: The Ethno-Cultural Persecution of Al-Akhdam in the Republic of Yemen: A Documentary & Advocacy Project|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.2202/1554-4419.1029|journal=Muslim World Journal of Human Rights|volume=2|issue=1|doi=10.2202/1554-4419.1029|s2cid=144671423|issn=1554-4419|url-access=subscription}}</ref>
Alternative theories suggest that some Somali Bantu tribes migrated to the riverine parts of the southern Horn of Africa as agriculturalists taking part in the millennia long ongoing Bantu expansion.<ref>Q.v. T. J. Hinnebusch, 'Prefixes, Sound Changes, and Subgroupings in the Coastal Kenyan Bantu Languages', Ph.D. thesis, UCLA, 1973; Hinnebusch, The Shungwaya Hypothesis: A Linguistic Reappraisal', in J. T. Gallagher (ed.), East African Cultural History (Syracuse, 1976), 1-41; D. Nurse, 'Bantu Migration into East Africa: Linguistic Evidence' in C. Ehret and M. Posnansky (eds.), The Archaeological and Linguistic Reconstruction of African History (Berkeley, 1982).</ref><ref>See Hinnebusch, 'The Shungwaya Hypothesis', 24—5. Also see T. T. Spear, 'Traditional Myths and Linguistic Analysis: Singwaya Revisited', History in Africa, 4 (1977), 229-46, which attempts to reconcile the linguistic evidence with Miji Kenda traditions of origin in Shungwaya. The most recent and, probably the best statement, of this thesis is to be found in D. Nurse and T. T. Spear, The Swahili: Reconstructing the History and Language of an African Society, 800-1500 (Philadelphia, 1985), 40-51.</ref> However, no reliable historical documentation exists directly linking the present-day Somali Bantu to the premodern civilizations of Somalia. Medieval travellers visiting Southern Somalia at the time described its inhabitants as being mostly ethnically similar to the inhabitants of Northern Somalia and made no ethnic distinctions besides noting the presence of Arab, Persian, and Indian traders.<ref>{{Citation|title=Ibn Battuta: Prehistory to 1400: Africa|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781452218458.n224|encyclopedia=Cultural Sociology of the Middle East, Asia, & Africa: An Encyclopedia|year=2012|place=United States|publisher=SAGE Publications, Inc.|doi=10.4135/9781452218458.n224|isbn=9781412981767|access-date=2022-01-16|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref name="Raunig">{{cite book|last=Raunig|first=Walter|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JpNY7VPn1WUC&pg=PA130|title=Afrikas Horn: Akten der Ersten Internationalen Littmann-Konferenz 2. bis 5. Mai 2002 in München|publisher=Otto Harrassowitz Verlag|year=2005|isbn=3-447-05175-2|pages=130}}.</ref>
The Mushunguli language is the sole surviving Somali Bantu language and is mutually intelligible with the Zigula language still spoken in Tanzania. Mushunguli's closest sister languages are Shambala, Bondei, and Ngulu which are languages originating from Tanzania and largely confined to it.
===Slave trade=== {{Main|Indian Ocean slave trade|Slavery in Somalia}} [[File:Servant or slave woman in Mogadishu.jpg|thumb|A Bantu servant woman in Mogadishu (1882–1883)]] The Indian Ocean slave trade was multi-directional and changed over time. To meet the demand for menial labor, black Africans from southeastern Africa bought by Somali, Omanis, Benadiri & Swahili slave traders & were sold in cumulatively large numbers over the centuries to customers in Morocco, Libya, Somalia, Egypt, Arabia, the Persian Gulf, India, the Far East and the Indian Ocean islands.<ref name="Refugee Reports"/><ref name="Gcam">Gwyn Campbell, ''The Structure of Slavery in Indian Ocean Africa and Asia'', 1 edition, (Routledge: 2003), p.ix</ref>
From 1800 to 1890, between 25,000–50,000 black African slaves are thought to have been sold from the slave market of Zanzibar to the Somali coast.<ref name=":2">{{cite web|url=http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/somali_bantu.pdf |title=The Somali Bantu: Their History and Culture |accessdate=18 October 2011 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20111016024128/http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/somali_bantu.pdf |archivedate=16 October 2011 }}</ref> Most of the slaves were taken from the Majindo, Makua, Nyasa, Yao, Zaramo and Zigua ethnic groups of Tanzania, Mozambique, and Malawi. Collectively, these Bantu groups are known as ''Mushunguli'', which is a term taken from ''Mzigula'', the Zigua tribe's word for "people" (the word holds multiple implied meanings including "worker", "foreigner", and "slave").<ref name="Refugee Reports">Refugee Reports, November 2002, Volume 23, Number 8</ref>
Bantu slaves were made to work in plantations owned by Somalis along the Shebelle and Jubba rivers, harvesting lucrative cash crops such as grain and cotton.<ref>Henry Louis Gates, ''Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience'', (Oxford University Press: 1999), p.1746</ref>
===Colonialism and the end of slavery=== Since the very end of the eighteen century, fugitive slaves from the Shebelle valley began to settle in the Jubba valley. By the late 1890s, when Italians and British occupied the Jubaland area, an estimated 35,000 former Bantu slaves were already settled there.
The Italian colonial administration abolished slavery in Somalia at the turn of the 20th century by decree of the King of Italy. Some Bantu groups, however, remained enslaved until the 1910s in the areas not totally dominated by the Italians.<ref name="Laitin1977">{{cite book|author=David D. Laitin|title=Politics, Language, and Thought: The Somali Experience|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LR8A4tEYZUAC&pg=PA98|year=1977|publisher=University of Chicago Press|isbn=978-0-226-46791-7|pages=29–30}}</ref> After World War I, many Somali Bantus, mainly the descendants of former slaves, became Catholics. They were principally concentrated in the Villaggio Duca degli Abruzzi and Genale plantations.<ref>Gresleri, G. ''Mogadiscio ed il Paese dei Somali: una identita negata''. p.71</ref>
Indeed, in 1895, the first 45 Bantu slaves were freed by the Italian colonial authorities under the administration of the chartered Catholic company ''Filonardi''. The former were later converted to Catholicism. Massive emancipation and conversion of slaves in Somalia<ref>Tripodi, Paolo. ''The Colonial Legacy in Somalia''. p. 65</ref> only began after the anti-slavery activist and explorer Luigi Robecchi Bricchetti informed the Italian public about the local slave trade and the indifferent attitude of the first Italian colonial government in Somalia toward it.<ref>[http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbhist.html History of Somali Bantu] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111101142417/http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbhist.html |date=1 November 2011 }}</ref>
==Contemporary situation==
===Profile=== thumb|A Bantu man working in the fields Somali Bantus simply refer to themselves as ''Bantu''. Those who can trace their origins to Bantu groups in southeast Africa refer to themselves collectively as ''Shanbara'', ''Shangama'' or ''Wagosha''. Those who trace their origins to Bantu tribes inhabiting areas further south call themselves ''Zigula'', ''Makua'', ''Yao'', ''Nyassa'', ''Ngindo'', ''Nyamwezi'', ''Mwera'' and other names, although the Somalis from Mogadishu called them with a discriminatory word all together ''Mushunguli''.<ref name="Calp"/>
Unlike Somalis, most of whom are traditionally nomadic herders, Somali Bantus are mainly sedentary subsistence farmers. The Somali Bantus' predominant physical traits also serve to further distinguish them from Somalis. Among these phenotypic characteristics of the Bantu are kinky (''jareer'') hair, while Somalis are soft-haired (''jilec'').<ref name="Calp2"/>
The majority of Somali Bantus have converted to Islam, which they first began embracing.<ref name="CALREL">{{cite web|url=http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbrelig.html |title=Somali Bantu – Religious Life |publisher=Cal.org |accessdate=18 October 2011 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20111101142436/http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbrelig.html |archivedate=1 November 2011}}</ref> Starting in the colonial period, some also began converting to Christianity.<ref>''A History of the Expansion of Christianity (volume Vi) the Great Century in Northern Africa and Asia A.d. 1800-a.d. 1914'', (Taylor & Francis), p.35.</ref> However, whether Muslim or Christian, many Bantu have retained their ancestral animist traditions, including the practice of possession dances and the use of magic .<ref name="CALREL"/> Many of these religious traditions closely resemble those practised in Tanzania, similarities which also extend to hunting, harvesting and music, among other things.<ref name="UNHCR">{{cite web|author=United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees |url=http://www.unhcr.org/publ/PUBL/3d9ac1502.pdf |title=Refugees Vol. 3, No. 128, 2002 UNHCR Publication Refugees about the Somali Bantu |publisher=Unhcr.org |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref>
Many Somali Bantus have also retained their ancestral social structures, with their Bantu tribe of origin in southeastern Africa serving as the principal form of social stratification. Smaller units of societal organization are divided according to matrilineal kinship groups,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Declich |first1=Francesca |title=Borders and borderlands as Resources in the Horn of Africa |journal=In Borders and Borderlands as Resources in the Horn of Africa (Feyissa, Dereje and Hoehne, Markus Virgil Ed.) |pages=169–186 |publisher=James and Currey |location=Oxford}}</ref> the latter of which are often interchangeable with ceremonial dance groupings.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Declich |first1=Francesca |title=Identity, dance and islam among People with Bantu Origins in Riverine Areas of Somalia |journal=In the Invention of Somalia (Ali Jimale Ed.) |date=2005 |pages=191–222}}</ref><ref name="Calp">{{cite web|url=http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbpeop.html |title=The Somali Bantu: Their History and Culture – People |publisher=Cal.org |accessdate=18 October 2011 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120420011930/http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbpeop.html |archivedate=20 April 2012}}</ref> Meanwhile, they do maintain some traditions of their own, such as the common act of basket weaving. Another important cultural aspect of the Bantu people consists art using bright colors and fabrics.<ref>{{Citation |title=Somali Bantu Health Sheet|doi = 10.1037/e547012011-001|doi-access=free}}</ref>
Primarily for security reasons, some Somali Bantus have attempted to attach themselves to groups within the Somalis' indigenous patrilineal clan system of social stratification.<ref name="Calp2">[https://web.archive.org/web/20120420011930/http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbpeop.html The Somali Bantu: Their History and Culture – People]: "Since many Bantu groups in pre-war Somalia wished to integrate into the dominant clan structure, identifying oneself as a Mushunguli was undesirable."</ref> These Bantus are referred to by the Somalis as ''sheegato'' or ''sheegad'' (literally "pretenders"<ref name="Apdasopapatnsothoa">I. M. Lewis, ''A pastoral democracy: a study of pastoralism and politics among the Northern Somali of the Horn of Africa'', (LIT Verlag Münster: 1999), p.190.</ref>), meaning they are not ethnically Somali and are attached to a Somali group on an adoptive, client basis. Somali Bantus that have retained their ancestral southeast African traditions have likewise been known to level sarcasm at other Bantus who have tried to associate themselves with their Somali patrons, albeit without any real animosity (the civil war has actually served to strengthen relationships between the various Bantu sub-groups).<ref name="Calp"/><ref>[http://208.106.251.104/report.aspx?reportid=1318 Horn of Africa: IRIN Update, 23 November – SOMALIA: Minority group to be resettled]{{dead link|date=October 2016 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref>J. Abbink, Rijksuniversiteit te Leiden. Afrika-Studiecentrum, ''The total Somali clan genealogy: a preliminary sketch'', (African Studies Centre: 1999)</ref>
All told, there has been very little co-mingling between Somali Bantus and Somalis. Formal intermarriage is extremely rare, and typically results in ostracism the few times it does occur.<ref name="UNHCR"/><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.brycs.org/documents/ft_BRYCS0392.pdf |title=URL Redirect |accessdate=2011-10-18 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120425074829/http://www.brycs.org/documents/ft_BRYCS0392.pdf |archivedate=25 April 2012}}</ref>
===Post-1991=== During the Somali Civil War, many Bantu were forced from their lands in the lower Juba River valley, as militiamen from various Somali clans took control of the area.<ref name="Calp3">{{cite web|url=http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbhist.html |title=SOMALI BANTU – Their History and Culture |publisher=Cal.org |accessdate=18 October 2011 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20111101142417/http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/sbhist.html |archivedate=1 November 2011}}</ref> Being visible minorities and possessing little in the way of firearms, the Bantu were particularly vulnerable to violence and looting by gun-toting militiamen.<ref name="UNHCR"/>
To escape war and famine, tens of thousands of Bantus fled to refugee camps like Dadaab in neighboring Kenya, with most vowing never to return to Somalia. In 1991, 12,000 Bantu people were displaced into Kenya, and nearly 3,300 were estimated to have returned to Tanzania.<ref name=":0"/> In 2002, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) moved a large number of Bantu refugees 1500 km to Kakuma in northwest Kenya because it was safer to process them for resettlement farther away from the Somali border.<ref name="Refugee Reports"/>
===Resettlement in the United States=== [[File:Banboyflor.jpg|thumb|right|A Somali Bantu refugee boy in Florida]] In 1999, the United States classified the Bantu refugees from Somalia as a priority and the United States Department of State first began what has been described as the most ambitious resettlement plan ever from Africa, with thousands of Bantus scheduled for resettlement in America.<ref name="OOA">{{cite web|last=Barnett |first=Don |url=http://www.cis.org/SomaliBantuRefugees |title=Out of Africa: Somali Bantu and the Paradigm Shift in Refugee Resettlement |date=October 2003 |publisher=Cis.org |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref> In 2003, the first Bantu immigrants began to arrive in U.S. cities, and by 2007, around 13,000 had been resettled to cities throughout the United States with the help of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the U.S. State Department, and refugee resettlement agencies across the country.<ref name="OOA"/>
Among the resettlement destinations, it is known that Salt Lake City, Utah received about 1,000 Bantus. Other cities in the southwest such as Denver, Colorado, San Antonio, Texas, and Tucson, Arizona have received a few thousand as well. In New England, Manchester, New Hampshire and Burlington, Vermont were also destinations selected for resettlement of several hundred.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Somali Bantu Experience: from East Africa to Maine |url=https://wiki.colby.edu/display/AY298B/More%2Binformation%2Bon%2BCommunity%2Band%2BEnvironment |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161226044304/https://wiki.colby.edu/display/AY298B/More+information+on+Community+and+Environment |archive-date=26 December 2016 |website=wiki.colby.edu}}</ref> The documentary film ''Rain in a Dry Land'' chronicles this journey, with stories of Bantu refugees resettled in Springfield, Massachusetts and Atlanta, Georgia.<ref>{{cite web|author=Anne Makepeace |url=https://www.pbs.org/pov/films/raininadryland/ |title=Rain in a Dry Land |publisher=Pbs.org |access-date=18 October 2011}}</ref> Plans to resettle the Bantu in smaller towns, such as Holyoke, Massachusetts and Cayce, South Carolina, were scrapped after local protests. There are also communities of several hundred to a thousand Bantu people in cities that also have high concentrations of ethnic Somalis such as the Minneapolis-St. Paul area,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.mtn.org/Video/news/somalistory.html |title=MTN News |publisher=Mtn.org |accessdate=18 October 2011 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110927144932/http://www.mtn.org/Video/news/somalistory.html |archivedate=27 September 2011}}</ref> Columbus, Ohio,<ref>{{cite web|last=Hampson |first=Rick |url=https://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-03-21-somali-bantu-cover_x.htm |title=After 3 years, Somalis struggle to adjust to U.S |work=USA Today |date=21 March 2006 |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref> Atlanta,<ref>{{cite web|author=Washington, DC |url=http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2003-06/a-2003-06-06-44-1.cfm?moddate=2003-06-06 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20110604101347/http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2003-06/a-2003-06-06-44-1.cfm?moddate=2003-06-06 |url-status=dead |archive-date=4 June 2011 |title=Somali Bantus in Georgia – 2003-06-06 | News |publisher=Voice of America |date=6 June 2003 |access-date=18 October 2011 }}</ref> San Diego,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.sbantucofsd.org/ |title=FAQ |publisher=Sbantucofsd.org |date=5 March 2004 |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref> Boston,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.hiiraan.com/news2/2008/may/somali_bantu_refugees_celebrate_mothers_day.aspx |title=Somali Bantu refugees celebrate Mothers Day |publisher=Hiiraan.com |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref> Pittsburgh,<ref>{{cite web|title=KIR - Lawrenceville|url=http://www.pitt.edu/~sorc/keepitreal/|publisher=University of Pittsburgh|accessdate=6 April 2013}}</ref> and Seattle,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.theirc.org/news/somali_bantu_to_arrive_in_seattle.html |title=News From The Field |publisher=Theirc.org |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref> with a notable presence of about 1,000 Bantus in Lewiston, Maine.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://wiki.colby.edu/display/AY298B/About+Us |title=About Us – The Somali Bantu Experience: From East Africa to Maine – Colby College Wiki |publisher=Wiki.colby.edu |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref> ''[https://www.dukeupress.edu/making-refuge Making Refuge]'' follows Somali Bantus' strenuous journey towards eventual resettlement in Lewiston and details several families' stories of relocating there.<ref name=":1">{{cite book |last1=Besteman |first1=Catherine |title=Making Refuge: Somali Bantu Refugees and Lewiston, Maine |date=February 2016 |publisher=Duke University Press |isbn=978-0-8223-6044-5 |pages=1–376}}</ref>
Upon their resettlement in Lewiston, however, Bantus were met with a great amount of hostility from local Lewiston residents. In 2002, former Mayor Laurier Raymond wrote an [https://www.immigrationshumancost.org/text/raymond.html open letter] to Somali Bantu residents in an effort to dissuade them from further relocation to Lewiston.<ref name="The Washington Post">{{cite news |last1=Powell |first1=Michael |title=In Maine Town, Sudden Diversity And Controversy |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2002/10/14/in-maine-town-sudden-diversity-and-controversy/9b64d489-1ccb-44e1-aee5-08034e2fae70/ |newspaper=The Washington Post |publisher=14 October 2002}}</ref> He proclaimed their resettlement to the town had become a "burden"<ref>{{cite web |last1=Raymond |first1=Laurier |title=A Letter to the Somali Community |url=https://www.immigrationshumancost.org/text/raymond.html |website=Immigration's Human Cost |publisher=1 October 2002}}</ref> on the community and predicted an overall negative impact on the town's social services and resources. In 2003, members of a white supremacist group demonstrated in support of the mayor's letter, which prompted a counter-demonstration of about 4,000 people at Bates College, as chronicled in documentary film The Letter. Despite such adversity, the Somali Bantu community in central Maine has continued to flourish and integrate in years since.<ref>{{cite web |last1=SBCA Maine |title=Somali Bantu Community Association |url=https://somalibantumaine.org/}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=City of Lewiston |title=Immigrant and Refugee Integration and Policy Development Working Group |url=https://www.lewistonmaine.gov/DocumentCenter/View/8885/REPORT---ImmigrantandRefugeeIntegrationandPolicyDevelopmentWorkingGroupFinalReport |publisher=December 2017}}</ref>
===Return to ancestral home=== Prior to the United States' agreement to accommodate Bantu refugees from Somalia, attempts were made to resettle the refugees to their ancestral homes in southeastern Africa. Before the prospect of emigrating to America was raised, this was actually the preference of the Bantus themselves. In fact, many Bantus voluntarily left the UN camps where they were staying, to seek refuge in Tanzania. Such a return to their ancestral homeland represented the fulfillment of a two-century old dream.<ref name="OOA"/>
While Tanzania was initially willing to grant the Bantus asylum, the UNCHR did not provide any financial or logistical guarantees to support the resettlement and integration of the refugees into Tanzania. The Tanzanian authorities also experienced additional pressure when refugees from neighbouring Rwanda began pushing into the western part of the country, forcing them to retract their offer to accommodate the Bantus.<ref name="UNHCR"/><ref name="OOA"/> On the other hand, the Bantus who spoke kizigula had already started arriving in Tanzania since before the war due to discrimination experienced in Somalia.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Declich |first1=Franceca |title=Can boundaries not border on one another? The Zigula (Somali Bantu) between Somalia and Tanzania |date=2010 |publisher=James and Currey |location=Oxford |pages=169–186}}</ref>
Mozambique, the other ancestral home of the Bantu, then emerged as an alternative point of resettlement. However, as it became clear that the United States was prepared to accommodate the Bantu refugees, the Mozambican government soon backed out on its promises, citing a lack of resources and potential political instability in the region where the Bantu might have been resettled.<ref name="OOA"/>
By the late 2000s, the situation in Tanzania had improved, and the Tanzanian government began granting Bantus citizenship and allocating them land in areas of Tanzania where their ancestors are known to have been taken from as slaves.<ref name="Tanzacc"/><ref name="UNHCR"/><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/UNHCR/8ad8ca67e1bba9703647c92f12b7db6d.htm |title=Somali Bantus gain Tanzanian citizenship in their ancestral land |publisher=Alertnet.org |accessdate=18 October 2011}}</ref>
In 2024, Somalia joined the East African Community, a trade bloc with many member states where the Somali Bantu have ancestral ties to and has the objective of establishing freedom of movement.<ref name=SBEAC1>{{Cite web |title=Somalia finally joins EAC as the bloc's 8th Partner State |url=https://www.eac.int/press-releases/3049-somalia-finally-joins-eac-as-the-bloc-s-8th-partner-state |access-date=2025-01-15 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240304163326/https://www.eac.int/press-releases/3049-somalia-finally-joins-eac-as-the-bloc-s-8th-partner-state |archive-date=2024-03-04 |website=www.eac.int}}</ref>
==See also== *History of Somali Bantus in Maine *Indian Ocean slave trade *Bantu peoples
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== General: *[http://www.unhcr.org/publ/PUBL/3d9ac1b24.pdf UNHCR Publication ''Refugees'' about the Somali Bantu] *[https://web.archive.org/web/20070927222109/http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/ The Somali Bantu: Their History and Culture] *[https://www.jstor.org/stable/3556840 Differences That Matter: The Struggle of the Marginalised in Somalia]
In the U.S.: *[http://www.colby.edu/somalibantu The Somali Bantu Experience] *[https://web.archive.org/web/20070928145151/http://www.refugeesusa.org/article.aspx?id=1195 Refugees USA] *[http://www.somalibantu.com/Utah%20State.htm Somali Bantus Arrive In Salt Lake City] *[http://www.sbcdcden.org/ Somali Bantu Community – Development Council of Denver] {{Authority control}}
Category:Somali Bantu Category:Bantu peoples Category:Southeast African diaspora Category:Ethnic groups in Somalia Category:Ethnic groups in Kenya Category:Ethnic groups in Tanzania Category:Racism in Somalia