Official language to the government in their native languages. In countries that do not formally designate an official language, a "de facto" national language usually evolves. English is the most common official language, with recognized status in 51 countries. Arabic, French, and Spanish are also widely recognized. An official language that is also an indigenous language is called "endoglossic", one that is not indigenous is "exoglossic". An instance is Nigeria which has three endoglossic official languages. By this the country aims to protect the indigenous languages although at the same time recognising the English language as its lingua franca. Around 500 BC,
Turks in Egypt Turkish descendants in Egypt. This is because Egypt's official censuses do not allow its citizens to declare their ethnic origin, language, or religion. An estimate from 1971 suggested that the population of Cretan Turks alone numbered 100,000 in Egypt. According to an article by Gamal Nkrumah in the Egyptian Al-Ahram Weekly, estimates regarding the population of the Turkish minority vary considerably, ranging from 100,000 to 1,500,000. In 1993 the Turkish scholar Prof. Dr. Metin Akar claimed that there was 1.5 million Turks living in Egypt. Some Turkish scholars have suggested considerably higher estimates. For example, in 2016, the Turkish journalist