Oku people (Sierra Leone)

Oku people

Mohammed Shitta Bey
Total population
25,000 (0.5% of population)
Regions with significant populations
Sierra Leone, Gambia, United States, United Kingdom
Languages
Yoruba Krio English
Religion
Sunni Islam (99%)
Related ethnic groups
Yoruba people

The Oku people or the Aku Marabout or Aku Mohammedans are an ethnic group in Sierra Leone and the Gambia, primarily the descendants of marabout, liberated Yoruba people who were released from slave ships and resettled in Sierra Leone as Liberated Africans or came as settlers in the mid-19th century.

Some Oku historically have intermarried since then with ethnic groups in Sierra Leone and the Gambia such as the Mandingo, Temne, Mende, and in some cases with the ethnic Sierra Leone Creole people. The Creole are primarily descendants of African-American former slaves, as well as some from Jamaica, Nova Scotia, and slaves liberated from illegal slave trading in the 19th century. The Oku people primarily reside in the communities of Fourah Bay, Fula Town, and Aberdeen.

The vast majority of Oku people are Muslim. They were able to translate Islamic ideologies that spread throughout the Sahel in the 11th-century. The Oku people have practiced sub-Saharan passages such as cliterodotomy since the late-19th century. A very small minority of them may have recently converted to Christianity in the late twentieth century. A large number of Oku people embraced Western education and other elements of Western culture prior to the Sierra Leone Civil War.

During British rule, the colonial government officially recognized various Oku neighborhoods as historical communities in Sierra Leone. Since independence, the national Sierra Leonean government has classified the Oku people as non-native Creoles although the Oku people are distinct from the Sierra Leone Creoles.

The Oku people have an extensive diaspora with Oku communities established in The Gambia and in Sierra Leone. The Oku people in Sierra Leone reside mainly in the capital cities of Banjul while the latter are in Freetown. In Sierra Leone the neighborhoods belonging to the Oku people are Fula Town, Fourah Bay, and some parts of Aberdeen Village (which has other areas occupied by Creoles).