MAIMANA (SW): Uzbeki, the native language of over 20 million speakers in the world is on the brink of extinction in Afghanistan, local intellectuals fear.
A gathering to discuss the ways and means to revive the language was held in the Uzbek heartland Maimana city, Faryab province on Saturday. Faryaab civil society lamented that the language was not given its due respect by the government and its native speakers.
“Uzbeki is becoming alien language in our homes”, they said while expressing worry over the fact that even the native speakers did not speak in Uzbeki often. Speakers suggested that there should be a struggle to make Uzbeki recognized as the third official language of the country.
It was mentioned that the Article 16 and 43 of the Constitution give citizen the right be educated in their native languages.
According to the Swedish encyclopedia Nationalencyklopedin, the number of native Uzbeki speakers is around 26 million in the world while the CIA World Factbook estimates it to be around 25 million. Uzbeki language belongs to the Eastern Turkic, or Qarluq, branch of the Turkic language family that also has external influences from Persian, Arabdi and Russian.
Ahmad Jawed Kiwan, a civil society activist in Faryaab, said on the occasion that the state-owned Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA) and local newspapers should broadcast and publish up to 50% of their content in Uzbeki.
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