Afan Oromo

Oromo=AfanOromoo==Oromiya all the same! == Headline text ==link title

Oromo, also known as Afaan Oromoo, Oromiffa(a), and sometimes in other languages by variant spellings of these names (Oromic, Afan Oromo, etc.), is an Afro-Asiatic language, and the most widely spoken of the Cushitic sub-phylum. It is spoken as a first language by approximately 25-6 million people of the Oromo and neighboring nationalities in Ethiopia and in Kenya. Formerly, the language and people were often referred to by non-Oromos within Ethiopia as well as by Europeans as Galla, but this term is no longer recognized in a modern context.

Oromo uses a modified Latin alphabet called Qubee, which was formally adopted in 1991, and used by the Oromo Liberation Front rebels by the late 1970's. The Saphalo script was an indigenous Oromo script invented by Sheikh Bakri Saphalo (also known by his birth name, Abubaker Usman Odaa) in the years following Italian invasion of Ethiopia, and used underground afterwards.

The Ge'ez abugida was the most openly used script in the past, though in Ethiopia, writing the Oromo language in any script had been banned by the government of Haile Selassie. With the adoption of Qubee, it is believed more texts were written in the Oromo language between 1991 and 1997 than in the previous 100 years