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The Kanuri People

image by Ivan Sache, 12 March 2001

Background
Description of the Flag

See also:

Background

The Kanuri people are an African ethnic group living largely in the lands of the former Bornu Empire in north eastern Nigeria, south eastern Niger, western Chad and northern Cameroon. Those generally called Kanuri include several subgroups and dialect groups. They are generally sedentary, engaging in farming, fishing in Lake Chad, trading and salt processing.
Ivan Sache, 12 March 2001

Description of the Flag

Nations Without States [eba94] (James Minahan, 1996) has an entry on Kanowra, the home of the Kanuri people (whose empire of Kanem-Bornu was one of the great states of the Sahel before the age of European imperialism). T he area is centered around Lake Chad and includes parts of Nigeria, Chad, Niger and Cameroon. Minahan describes the flag of the Kanuri national movement as being "a horizontal tricolour of blue, yellow and green, representing the sky, the land, and the water of Lake Chad."

It should be noted that, while the Republic of Sudan also used a blue-yellow-green horizontal tricolor from 1956 to 1970, that flag had a ratio of 1:2. The line drawing in Minahan's entry on Kanowra shows a 2:3 flag.
Ned Smith, 11 March 2001