Fourah Bay is a neighbourhood in

Freetown Freetown is the capital and largest city of Sierra Leone. It is a major port city on the Atlantic Ocean and is located in the Western Area of the country. Freetown is Sierra Leone's major urban, economic, financial, cultural, educational an ...

Sierra Leone Sierra Leone,)]. officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered by Liberia to the southeast and Guinea surrounds the northern half of the nation. Covering a total area of , Sierra ...

. It is located in the East end of Freetown.

Ethnicity and religion

Fourah Bay is an overwhelmingly Muslim majority neighborhood. The Oku people, an ethnic group predominantly of

Yoruba The Yoruba people (, , ) are a West African ethnic group that mainly inhabit parts of Nigeria, Benin, and Togo. The areas of these countries primarily inhabited by Yoruba are often collectively referred to as Yorubaland. The Yoruba consti ...

descent, make up the majority of the population of Fourah Bay. The Oku are virtually all

Muslims Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abra ...

based on the Sunni tradition of Islam. Fourah Bay is widely known for its conservative Muslim population. Fourah Bay is also home to a prominent minority of

Salafi The Salafi movement or Salafism () is a reform branch movement within Sunni Islam that originated during the nineteenth century. The name refers to advocacy of a return to the traditions of the "pious predecessors" (), the first three generat ...

Muslims, a deeply conservative branch within Sunni Islam. The

Jamiatul Atiq Masjid Jamiatul Atiq Mosque, also locally known as Fourah Bay Mosque, is a large mosque located in the neighborhood of Fourah Bay, in Freetown, Sierra Leone. The mosque regularly holds Salah, Islamic prayer services five times a day; and its also tea ...

is the main

mosque A mosque (; from ar, مَسْجِد, masjid, ; literally "place of ritual prostration"), also called masjid, is a Place of worship, place of prayer for Muslims. Mosques are usually covered buildings, but can be any place where prayers (sujud) ...

that serves the local Muslim community; it is one of the most prominent mosques in Sierra Leone. The community at Fourah Bay has been a source of many expert Muslim scholars, including renowned

Sunni Islamic scholar Sheikh Alhaji Sulaiman Alpha Carew. Many contemporary Muslim scholars from here were once students of Carew, including such men as Sheikh

Mohamed Sanusi Tejan Sheikh Alhaji Mohamed Sanusi Tejan (January 19, 1950August 17, 2016) was a revered Sierra Leonean Oku people (Sierra Leone), Oku Sunni Muslim preacher, Islamic scholar, Islamic theologist, architect, and the former Chief Imam of the Jamiat ...

, Sheikh Muhammad Alpha Macauley, Sheikh Alpha Musa Nabie, Sheikh Muhammad Sanusi Savage, Sheikh Alpha Teslim Williams, and Sheikh Nasim Sahid. Fourah Bay Muslim scholars are widely known for maintaining neutrality in Sierra Leonean politics and its rare for Fourah Bay Muslim leadership to publicly criticize Sierra Leonean government. There is a small Christian minority community here. They maintain a couple of churches. The

Pentecostal Pentecostalism or classical Pentecostalism is a Protestant Charismatic Christian movement

Church of Fourah Bay serves part of the community. Muslims and Christians have had an amicable history here.

Fourah Bay College Fourah Bay College is a public university in the neighbourhood of Mount Aureol in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Founded on 18 February 1827, it is the first western-style university built in Sub-Saharan Africa and, furthermore, the first university- ...

was founded here in the nineteenth century by the British and settlers, to serve the new communities of Freetown and others. It was started as a kind of seminary or boys' academy, and gradually developed with a full academic curriculum.

Politics

Since independence in 1961 to present, Fourah Bay has traditionally been a stronghold of the Sierra Leone People's Party (SLPP), the current ruling party. The SLPP is popular in Fourah Bay, and maintains majority support among its residents. Mohammed Sanusi Mustapha (widely known as M.S. Mustapha) is known as one of the founding fathers who led Sierra Leone to Independence. He was also a prominent member of the Sierra Leone People's Party. He was a very close ally and personal friend of Sir Milton Margai, Sierra Leone's first prime minister after independence. Mustapha was highly popular here. Other notable politicians from Fourah Bay include

Abdul Tejan Cole Abdul (also transliterated as Abdal, Abdel, Abdil, Abdol, Abdool, or Abdoul; ar, عبد ال, ) is the most frequent transliteration of the combination of the Arabic word '' Abd'' (, meaning "Servant") and the definite prefix '' al / el'' (, mea ...

Haja Afsatu Kabba Haja Afsatu Olayinka Ebishola Savage Kabba is a Sierra Leonean Oku people (Sierra Leone), Oku politician and former Sierra Leone minister of Energy and Power. She served as a member of Parliament of Sierra Leone from the Western Area Urban Distr ...

and

Madina Rahman Medina,, ', "the radiant city"; or , ', (), "the city" officially Al Madinah Al Munawwarah (, , Turkish: Medine-i Münevvere) and also commonly simplified as Madīnah or Madinah (, ), is the Holiest sites in Islam, second-holiest city in Islam, ...

. The current president,

Juda Bio Juda may refer to: People * Adele Juda (1888–1949), Austrian psychologist and neurologist * Annely Juda (1914–2006), German art dealer * Elsbeth Juda (1911–2014), British photographer * Paul Juda (born 2001), American artistic gymnast Othe ...

is popular in Fourah Bay. Some notable Oku families in Fourah Bay include the Alharazim, Ibrahim, Macauley, Alghali, Deen, Mahdi, Lewally, Cole, Rahman, Bakarr, Savage, Sahid, and Carew families.

References

Populated places in Sierra Leone Oku people {{SierraLeone-geo-stub