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PEOPLE GROUP PROFILE

The Bakwele of Gabon

The Bakwele of Gabon, numbering approximately 5,800 people, are No Longer Unreached. They are an Indigenous Central African ethnic group living primarily in eastern Gabon, the Republic of the Congo, and Cameroon. They are also known as Kwele. They are an Indigenous people in the Bantu, Central-Congo people cluster of the Sub-Saharan African Peoples affinity bloc. Their primary language is Bekwel and their primary religion is Protestantism.

Photo by Google. (2025). Image generated by Gemini 2.5 Flash: Bakwele

Fast Facts:

Affinity Group: Sub-Saharan African Peoples
Country: Gabon
People Cluster: Bantu, Central-Congo
Primary Language(s): Bekwel (bkw)
Primary Religion(s): Protestantism
Population: 5,800
Strategic Progress Index (SPI): No Longer Unreached
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): 2% or Greater but Less than 5% Evangelical
People Group ID: PG013174
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Pray for the Bakwele of Gabon

Join others around the world in praying for the lost to be saved, the gospel to advance, the global Church to grow, and for laborers to be sent out and sustained in the harvest.

Pray Now!
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Dig Deeper (Religion):

Primary Religion: Protestantism
Religious Affiliation: Christianity

—
%
Protestantism Adherents

Dig Deeper (Language):

Primary Language: Bekwel
Language Family: Atlantic-Congo

100%
%
Bekwel Speakers

Media Resources in Bekwel:

Films:

Provided by the Jesus Film Project

View all resources

Bible Resources in Bekwel:

Provided by Faith Comes by Hearing

Or check out the Bekwel bible at Bible.com

Linked from YouVersion

View all resources

Explore Lostness and Next Steps

Unengaged and Unreached

Strategic Priority Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached (SPI: 2), which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations among which there are no known efforts focused on establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.
Lostness Priority Index (LPI): Marginally Reached People Group, (LPI: 4), 3% to 6% Evangelical.
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): 2% or Greater but Less than 5% Evangelical (GSEC: 4), this people group is greater than or equal to 2% evangelical

Next steps for the Bakwele:
Begin signifcant prayer and fasting for this group
Send cross-cultural teams to discover and research this people group
Begin gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group

SPI: Unreached yet Engaged

The Bakwele are Engaged yet Unreached, which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations but there are sustained efforts at establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.

Next steps for the Bakwele:
Continue prayer and fasting for this group
Continue gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group
Begin training up local leaders to lead and develop strategies to reach their own people

SPI: No longer Unreached

The Bakwele are No Longer Unreached, which means there are more than 2% evangelical Christian populations and there are churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice. There is still more to be done among them.

Next steps for the Bakwele:
Empower local believers to begin praying for their own people
Continue gospel seed sowing and church planting
Encourage local leaders to being leading church planting strategy and looking for Unreached and Unengaged groups nearby

Pray specifically for the Bakwele of Gabon

Listen, my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him?
readJames 2:5

Pray for those living in despair to experience the riches of God's love and the hope of eternal life through faith in Christ.

You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
readJames 4:4

Pray that the lost will be convicted of their friendship with the world, which is hostility toward God, and that they will turn from their sin and embrace the grace and mercy of God through Christ Jesus.

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
readPhilippians 2:5-7

Pray that as people place their faith in Christ, they will imitate His humility in all they do.

Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man.
readActs 17:29

Pray that God will send out laborers to tell people of the one true God and, as the good news is shared, bring about repentance and belief as they turn from idols and follow Jesus.

Bakwele Across Countries (ROP3 - 100830) reported in the following countries:

To download a comprehensive people group list in spreadsheet form, visit our Research Data page.

Peoplegroups.org relies on updates from the field and other organizations for much of our data, so if you have any updates, please contact us. We use various international naming standards. For a list of these standards and fields, visit our Definitions page.

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