Afro-Romanians are citizens or residents of

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...

who are of African descent. Afro-Romanian populations are mostly concentrated in major cities of Romania. Africans have been immigrating to Romania since the

Communist Era A Communist Era is a sustained period of national government by a single party following the philosophy of Marxism–Leninism. Many countries have experienced such a period of Communist rule. Current communist states China The Chinese Communist ...

. The majority of African-Romanians are of mixed ancestry, usually being the children of a Romanian parent and an African student who came to Romania.

Nicolae Ceaușescu Nicolae Ceaușescu ( , ; – 25 December 1989) was a Romanian communist politician and dictator. He was the general secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 to 1989, and the second and last Communist leader of Romania. He ...

had a plan to educate the African elites. Most Africans who studied in Romania during the Ceaușescu era came from Sub-Saharan African countries such as

Central African Republic The Central African Republic (CAR; ; , RCA; , or , ) is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It is bordered by Chad to the north, Sudan to the northeast, South Sudan to the southeast, the DR Congo to the south, the Republic of th ...

, Sudan,

DRC The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...

, Republic of the Congo, and other states, primarily from

West Africa West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, M ...

and

Equatorial Africa Equatorial Africa is an ambiguous term that sometimes is used to refer either to the equatorial region of Sub-Saharan Africa traversed by the Equator, more broadly to tropical Africa or in a biological and geo-environmental sense to the intra- ...

, with which Ceaușescu developed close relations, as well as from

Maghreb The Maghreb (; ar, الْمَغْرِب, al-Maghrib, lit=the west), also known as the Arab Maghreb ( ar, المغرب العربي) and Northwest Africa, is the western part of North Africa and the Arab world. The region includes Algeria, ...

(see Arabs in Romania). Since the early 60s, young people from around the world came to study in the

Socialist Republic of Romania The Socialist Republic of Romania ( ro, Republica Socialistă România, RSR) was a Marxist–Leninist one-party socialist state that existed officially in Romania from 1947 to 1989. From 1947 to 1965, the state was known as the Romanian Peop ...

. The communist state leadership wanted to link mutual friendship with different countries. After the fall of the communism, the numbers of Afro-Romanians increased. Currently, in Romania, most Africans are students, refugees, guest workers or children from mixed-families of a Romanian parent and an African student or worker who came to Romania.

Areas

In Bucharest, although Afro-Romanians live in all parts of the city, most of them are concentrated in the

Giurgiului Giurgiului () is a neighborhood in the southern part of the Romanian capital Bucharest, in Sector 5, near Berceni and Ferentari. Like Berceni, Giurgiului has plenty of 10-storey blocks of flats that were built under Communist rule, starting ...

and Baicului areas.

Notable individuals

Fashion designers

* Joseph Seroussi

Modelling

Agnès Matoko Agnès Matoko is a Romanian model of paternal Congolese descent. She is the niece of the famous Congolese general Bouissa Matoko. Her father is official treasurer of the Republic of the Congo. Matoko graduated from Bucharest Academy of Economic S ...

Music

* Kamara Ghedi * Veronika Tecaru * Julie Mayaya *

Tobi Ibitoye Oluwatobi Ayokunle Ibitoye (born 9 August 1993) better known as Tobi Ibitoye, is a Nigerian-born Romanian singer and songwriter from Bucharest. He was a finalist on 5th edition of The Voice of Romania and is now signed to an independent record lab ...

Politicians

* Gaston Bienvenu Mboumba Bakabana

Sports

Nana Falemi Ngassam Nana Falemi (born 5 May 1974) is a former footballer who played as a defensive midfielder. Born and raised in Romania to a Cameroonian father and a Romanian mother, he capped for the Cameroon national team. International career Nana F ...

- Footballer * Jean-Claude Bozga - Footballer * Calvin Tolmbaye - Footballer * Baudoin Kanda - Footballer * Yasin Hamed - Footballer *

Karim Adeyemi Karim-David Adeyemi (born 18 January 2002) is a German professional footballer who plays as a winger, striker or attacking-midfielder for Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund and the Germany national team. Club career Red Bull Salzburg Adeyem ...

- Footballer *

Benjamin Adegbuyi Benjamin Adekunle Miron Adegbuyi (born January 24, 1985) is a Romanian kickboxer and professional boxer. He is a two-time Glory Heavyweight Championship challenger and three-time winner of heavyweight tournament. Adegbuyi is also Superkombat Wo ...

- Kickboxer * Stephen Hihetah - Rugby player *

Giordan Watson Giordan Watson (born 24 October 1985) is an American-Romanian professional basketball player for Cluj of the Romanian Liga Națională. Standing at 178 cm (5 ft 10 in), Watson primarily plays as point guard. A naturalized Romanian, he a ...

- Basketball player * Uchechukwu Iheadindu - Basketball player *

Annemarie Părău Annemarie Gödri-Părău (born March 8, 1984) is a Romanian professional female basketball player. She is Nigerian descent through her father. As a member of the senior Romanian national basketball team, Gödri-Părău competed at the 2005 EuroBa ...

- Basketball player *Chike Onyejekwe - Handball player *Nneka Onyejekwe - Volleyball player

Television

*Cabral Ibacka *Laura Nureldin *Nadine Voindrouh *Désirée Malonga *Florina Fernandes

References

{{Portal bar, Romania, Africa African diaspora in Europe Ethnic groups in Romania People of African descent, Romanian Romanian people of African descent,