Languages in Central African Republic

French is the official language of Central African Republic while Sango is the national language. Taught in schools and used in written communications with an alternate of Francais, French is classified as Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Italo-Western and Galo-Iberian, and has the Latin script as its writing system. In France, it is spoken by about 53 million people and by 67.8 million in other countries, and by another 50 million second-language speakers around the world.

As the country’s national language, Sango is spoken by a majority of the population especially those living near the Ubangi River basins. A brief history of the language shows that it began as a medium of communication after colonization. In 1910, it became as the country’s lingua franca and was adopted in the 1920s by the Roman Catholics and Protestant missionaries as a religious language. In 1996 it was declared as co-official language with French after the Protestants published the first article written in Sango. In Bangui and in a few urban centers, it is the most frequently used in many households, eventually becoming as the spoken language in education and the government as well as on radio and television programs and broadcasts.

The other languages spoken in the country include Banda, Gbaya, Limassa, Adamawa-Eastern, Bantu, Arabic and Hausa, with the last two languages being widely spoken in the Muslim communities. Banda is spoken in mid-southern, south-central and west-central areas of the country; Gbaya in the northwest and southwest; and Limassa in the Ngundi villages.