How a stranger made me rediscover Kaduna – Malumfashi

Bookshelf: Congratulations on being shortlisted for the Koffi Addo Prize for Creative Nonfiction. Sada Malumfashi: Thank you very much. With so many talents on the long list it’s a real honour to make it this far. Bookshelf: How did you feel when you were announced as one of those selected and what was your first […]

Bookshelf: Congratulations on being shortlisted for the Koffi Addo Prize for Creative Nonfiction.

Sada Malumfashi: Thank you very much. With so many talents on the long list it’s a real honour to make it this far.

Bookshelf: How did you feel when you were announced as one of those selected and what was your first reaction?

Malumfashi: After the announcement of the long list, I actually did not give it any more thought, and then came the mail that yelled to my face that I am among the final three writers on the Koffi Addo Prize. It felt really surreal. I am still really ecstatic about it.

Bookshelf: Let’s talk about your shortlisted entry, ‘Finding Binyavanga’. When and how did the story begin to form in your mind?

Malumfashi: It was a story that chose me and chased me to write it. In 2016, a few but diverse collective of young writers in Kaduna hosted Kenyan author and the second winner of the Caine Prize for African Writing, Binyavanga Wainaina for a few days. Even though he had been to Nigeria numerous times, it was Binyavanga’s first time in Northern Nigeria. I was part of this crew and it was this engagement with Binyavanga that is the central point of my piece. I wouldn’t say there was a specific moment the story began to form, but rather, the story was a sum of that encounter. I was a part of the story and not just the creator, and it was something I had to vomit out on paper.

Bookshelf: You are a prolific nonfiction writer. What informed your decision to send that particular piece for the contest? Or was that the only story that fit the criteria?

Malumfashi: When the call for the Koffi Addo Prize was announced, I always knew this was the particular piece I would be sending in because this work provides a means for me to pull others into this part of the world I love to write about. I am glad it is doing just that, generating conversations.

Bookshelf: You may have titled your story, ‘Finding Binyavanga’, but it seemed it was more of a story about Kaduna city…

Malumfashi: Yes. This is because I only discovered a lot of things about my own city with the arrival of Binyavanga into this idea of Kaduna I nursed. So the city appeared to me in a different light, like something I have been staring at, without actually having a good look at it. I finally met this Kaduna in its nakedness and out of preconceived ideas. It was then finding Binyavanga that led me to finding Kaduna.

Bookshelf: In the story, while driving around Barnawa, in Kaduna South, something seemed to click inside of you, a realisation, that it looked like Unguwan Rimi, which is situated on the north side of the city. What was this thing you discovered and how has it changed your perception about this ‘divided city’?

Malumfashi: I think it is the discovery of the fact that nothing is actually different. It is all the same thing on both sides. I now see myself as a vehicle to tell the stories of the city. I can no longer gate keep the stories, and I cannot allow fear to block them. So the whole experience has taught me to try and see things about my own city in the way and manner an outsider might project them. To remember that the little things I neglect might be for a stranger, very important. So I learn to embrace all.

Bookshelf: What in your opinion, does Kaduna need to unite its people?

Malumfashi: Honestly, I do not know. You cannot teach people to be united. That comes naturally. What we do is to teach people to hate, right from the beginning. I can only do my little bit, embrace the little I can, and learn to tolerate and love more.

Bookshelf: You are passionate about Hausa literature. This is evident in some of your works, particularly, ‘Historical Echoes: The Literature of Hausa Women’ published in Saraba Magazine. What level of research did it take to trace the writings of women like Nana Asma’u, Usman Danfodio’s daughter, who lived from 1793 to 1864?

Malumfashi: I grew up reading a lot of Hausa books from my father’s library and I learnt to read first in Hausa before English. ‘Historical Echoes’ is one of my most favourite works because it took a lot of unearthing and deep reading to write it. Surprisingly, there is a lot of literature available on Nana Asma’u, mostly written by Westerners. Beverley Mack and Jean Boyd specifically are authorities on the life, times and writings of Nana Asma’u. So that aspect was actually not as difficult as the research on the female musicians and poets, like Uwaliya Mai Amada and Sa’adatu Barmani Choge whom had fewer literary works on their wonderful craft available, especially in English. I was privileged though to have read a lot of critical appraisals of their art in Hausa, with my father’s library filled with books in Hausa serving as an asset during the course of my research. I am glad I have been able to contribute my own little quota by writing on these great female literary champions from Northern Nigeria.

Bookshelf: How did writing begin for you, generally?

Malumfashi: I will say it began through reading. I read Magana Jari Ce, Ruwan Bagaja, Shaihu Umar and I imagined things. These early imaginations I assume were the beginning of my writing. I remember dabbling with poetry also when I was about nine years old, in the Kiddies Section of New Nigerian Newspapers. Then I grew up, went to science class, went on to study Pharmacy in the University and I did not know I would be writing again, well, because I was now destined to be a scientist. But then in the tail end of my University days, writing found me again. It is this singular thing I know how to do, and I really enjoy doing it.

Bookshelf: What are your plans if you win the Koffi addo Prize?

Malumfashi: (Laughs) I really do not know. Maybe get to read more awesome books. We will see.

Bookshelf: What are you working on at the moment?

Malumfashi: I am summoning the courage to begin work on two different novels.