One of the distinct ethnic groups of East Africa, the Burji is believed to have originated in the Liban region of northern Ethiopia and was part of the Amhara people. The Burji language still possesses a significant lexical similarity with the Amhara language. In the latter part of the 16th century, a dispute between the Burji and the Boran caused the Burji to depart in a westerly direction, moving first to Abuno and then to the mountainous area of Barbuda.
Precise facts and numbers of a population primarily sedentary farmers rather than herders and pastoralists are hard to come by. Before the 1896 Abyssinian conquest of Africa, the Burji population was estimated to be around 1.5 million by Cardinal Gugliemo Massaja. On the other hand, contemporary historian Vittorio Bottego estimated the Burji population to be only 200,000.
The Burji community came under pressure from Emperor Menelik II, whose rule of Ethiopia spanned from 1890 to 1913. Doubling territory under Ethiopian control during this period, Menelik set his sights on Burji country in 1895. When Menelik sent General Ras Gadi to subdue the country, Burji leader Guyo Aba Gada advised restraint, and his people yielded to the new rulers without resistance.
After Menelik achieved a historic victory at Adowa against Italy in October 1896, a peace treaty commenced a period of ruthless repression of local ethnic populations. Over a short period, the Burji went from being independent and self-sufficient to one allocated to military leaders as forced labor, or “Gabbar or Ser.” This led to a widespread exodus, at the start of the 20th century, of Burji people from Ethiopia to Marsabit District, Yavelo Province, in northern Kenya.
This move also reflected a plan by the British colonial commissioner to introduce farming in the region, which was traditionally inhabited by pastoralists such as the Borana, Gabra, and Rendille. At the British Consul’s request, a few Burji farmers and entrepreneurs started farming operations in the Marsabit region. With crops established, local people no longer had to rely on livestock for sustenance, and a minority Burji community was established. Unfortunately, as in Ethiopia, this culture was marginalized over time, with the Kenyan 1978 National Housing and Population Census eliminating the Burji as an official people with its own culture and history to be counted.
Today, the Ethiopian ethnic Burji community numbers 129,000, with approximately 40 percent Christian Evangelicals and others belonging to ethnic religions. Unfortunately, cultural hegemony and persecution are still an issue in Ethiopia and Kenya, with international organizations having an important role in countering this.
Among such nonprofits is Wycliffe Associates, which spearheads translations of the New Testament Bible into underrepresented languages around the globe. The nonprofit, facing church vandalization and attacks on transformed Christians in the Burji community, spearheads efforts to transcribe the Bible into a language of faith that all can understand and follow.
Another effort culturally vital centers on the work of Fiston Lusambo, a British-Congolese composer and guitarist, who has made field recordings in Burji, Turkana, and Oromo communities of Kenya. The focus is on capturing the sounds of traditional instruments such as nyatiti, adeudeu, orutu, and adeudeu within authentic settings. With the recordings supported by the Arts Council of England, they have been mastered in the UK and released as part of an international compilation album.
