In 2006, Olpak founded the first officially recognised organisation of Afro-Turks, the Africans' Culture and Solidarity Society (Afrikalılar Kültür ve Dayanışma Derneği) in Ayvalık. The opening ceremony was attended by Ali Moussa Iye, the Chief of UNESCO Slave Routes Project . A principal aim of the association is to promote studies of oral history of Afro-Turks, a community history of whom was usually ignored by official historiography in Turkey.

Olpak's story is told in the Turkish film Baa Baa Black Girl, which discusses how his grandfather was whose African grandfather was purchased as a household slave by an Turkish family, but later moved to Istanbul after the Turkish Revolution in 1922.

Olpak gives an estimate of 2,000,000 for the people of African ancestry who live on the littoral between Antalya and İstanbul .

Notes

External links

• Afro-Turk Website of the Afro-Turks' association in Ayvalık
• Turks with African ancestors want their existence to be felt, Today's Zaman, 25 June 2008