The Pacific island nation of Nauru has officially changed its name to the Republic of Naoero, reclaiming the traditional designation that European colonisers had long since set aside, in a move the government says is fundamentally about cultural heritage and national pride.
The change follows a constitutional amendment passed by parliament in May, which had initially been paired with plans for a national referendum. Those plans were subsequently dropped, with President David Adeang explaining in a social media post that such a vote was unnecessary.
"The decision not to pursue a referendum was reached after thoughtful deliberation that Naoero is not a new name seeking acceptance by the people," Adeang said. "It is already the identity of the people, is on the national coat of arms, and spoken in the community; and importantly is allowed by the constitution."
Under the change, the abbreviated form of the country's name will be Naoero, while citizens will now be referred to as dei-Naoero. The government has formally notified international organisations and other nations of the change, with the transition already underway.
A name rooted in history
The story behind the name is a familiar one across the Pacific. When European colonisers arrived, they found the island's traditional name — Naoero — difficult to pronounce, and so simplified it to Nauru. The anglicised version stuck for generations, carrying forward a linguistic legacy of colonisation long after its political structures had dissolved.
Adeang was emphatic that the renaming was not a political act. "This is about preserving the legacy of our ancestors and strengthening the future of our children," he said, framing the decision instead as a matter of identity and heritage.
Naoero is among the world's smallest nations — third-smallest globally, behind only Vatican City and Monaco — with a population of approximately 12,000 people. Despite its size, the symbolic weight of the name change carries significance well beyond its borders.
Naoero joins a growing global movement
The decision places Naoero among a growing list of nations that, over the past half-century, have shed colonial-era names in favour of those that better reflect their own languages, histories, and peoples.
In the Pacific region alone, the precedents are numerous. Tuvalu and Kiribati reclaimed their names in 1978 and 1979 respectively, abandoning the colonial designations of the Ellice Islands and Gilbert Islands. Vanuatu followed in 1980, retiring the name New Hebrides upon gaining independence. And Timor-Leste adopted its current name in 2002, having previously been known by an Indonesian designation during the years of occupation.
Beyond the Pacific, the trend has gathered pace across multiple continents. In Africa, Namibia replaced the name Southwest Africa in 1990. The Republic of Côte d'Ivoire moved away from the Ivory Coast in 1986 and has since refused to acknowledge any translation of its name from French. Eswatini — formerly Swaziland — made its change in 2018 to mark 50 years of Swazi independence, with the new name translating to "land of the Swazis" and also helping to avoid long-standing confusion with Switzerland.
Cabo Verde officially ended international use of the anglicised "Cape Verde" in 2013, after national delegates requested the United Nations use only the Portuguese form — a name now familiar to many football fans following the nation's notable run in the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Further afield, Türkiye is among the most recent major nations to assert a new name internationally. The campaign began in 2021, driven by President Recep Erdoğan's push for international bodies to adopt the Turkish spelling and pronunciation, which he said best represented "the culture, civilisation and values of the Turkish nation."
Identity, not politics
What unites these name changes, across vastly different regions and circumstances, is a common thread: the assertion that a nation's name should reflect its own people and their language, not the preferences or limitations of those who arrived from elsewhere.
For Naoero, that assertion is grounded in lived cultural reality. The traditional name was never truly lost — it remained embedded in the national coat of arms and in everyday use within the community. In that sense, as Adeang argued, the constitutional change formalised something that was already true on the ground.
The transition process is now underway across official government channels, and international bodies have been notified. For a nation of 12,000 people on a tiny island in the central Pacific, the change is modest in logistical terms. But as a statement of who the dei-Naoero are — and where they come from — it carries considerable meaning.
Naoero becomes the latest entry in a decades-long global story about the relationship between language, colonisation, and the right of peoples to name themselves on their own terms.
