Questioning love of the Hausa kind

But the other night, when I flipped on Africa Magic, Hausa, and watched parts one and two of the film Balaraba, directed by Aminu Saira, screenplay by Nasir Gwangwazo, I was struck by how powerful and provocative a well-told love story can be.  The names “Romeo and Juliet” from the Shakespearean play have become a […]

But the other night, when I flipped on Africa Magic, Hausa, and watched parts one and two of the film Balaraba, directed by Aminu Saira, screenplay by Nasir Gwangwazo, I was struck by how powerful and provocative a well-told love story can be.  The names “Romeo and Juliet” from the Shakespearean play have become a cliché for lovers, even here in Nigeria, but Romeo and Juliet isn’t a simple love story; it also exposes the tragedies of a corrupted and divided society, still relevant even four hundred years after it was written. One of my favourite renditions of the play is Baz Luhrmann’s 1996 film William Shakespeare’s Romeo+Juliet. Here, the famous story is set in a dystopian, decadent contemporary world, reminiscent of Miami, Florida. Feuding elders neglect their children for parties and incestuous affairs. The Montague and Capulet children brawl in the street.  The love between the young Romeo and Juliet, who have only just met, is the one pure thing in a filthy world. Even more compelling than the two lovers, for me is the figure of the priest who secretly marries the young couple, hoping to heal the rift between their two warring families. When things go wrong, the cleric, one of the only responsible adult figures in their lives, desperately tries to handle two suicidal teenagers. In the closing scene after the lovers have committed suicide, the Prince of Verona chastens the families:  “See, what a scourge is laid upon your hate,/That heaven finds means to kill your joys with love./And I for winking at your discords too/Have lost a brace of kinsmen: all are punish’d.” The most famous love story of the West is not just a tale of two lovers, but a larger warning to the society in which the lovers live, the consequences of hatred, corruption, and leaders who look the other way.
Balaraba and other Hausa love stories play a similar function of revealing social tensions and questioning accepted norms. Scholar Brian Larkin in his book, Signal and Noise, theorizes that love becomes “the idiom whereby the issues of betrayal and insecurity […] are formed and aired in Hausa society” (205). Near the beginning of Balaraba(Warning: In my discussion of the film, I give much of the plot away), Balaraba’s father (Basir Nayaya), the chief imam of a village, and the Sarki of the village (Musa Abdullahi) agree that the sarki’s son Muntari (Baballe Hayatu) and Balaraba (Sadiya Gyale) will marry. It seems like a good match. Balaraba has known Muntari since childhood and is a close friend of the Sarki’s daughter (Fati K.K.).  But a complication quickly comes in the form of a dashing Youth Corper Balarabe (Adam Zango) who has declared eternal love for Balaraba. After his service ends, he promises to come back to the village and marry her.  When Balaraba’s father tells her about the planned marriage with Muntari, she is devastated but agrees to the marriage so as not to shame her father. Bashir Nayaya and Hadiza Ahmad skillfully play Balaraba’s parents, who in one charming scene imagine her marriage as happy as their own but who quickly begin to worry about their daughter. They  truly love Balaraba and want her happiness, but are now caught in an awkward political situation with the father of Muntari. The sophisticated Balarabe, who has defied the expectations of both Balaraba’s skeptical friend and his snooty mother by returning to the village to ask her hand in marriage, begins to reveal his character in his lack of sympathy for his lover. He tells her he never wants to see her again unless she breaks off the intended marriage with “that villager.” Eventually, the noble Muntari who deeply loves Balaraba honours her request  to be released from the promised marriage. His father tells Balaraba’s father to let the girl marry the one she loves.
Unfortunately, although Balarabe has told Balaraba that she is as close to him as his own blood, their newly-wed happiness is soon flawed by a lesion that appears on Balaraba’s beautiful face. Her face is quickly covered with pustules, and to top it off, the doctor tells Balarabe, she will not be able to bear children. Balarabe confides to the doctor that he cannot stay married to a woman who has lost her beauty, let alone one who cannot bear children, and he abandons Balaraba in her parent’s house. The noble “villager” Muntari, however, upon his return from schooling abroad, tells a new doctor (Ali Nuhu) he will not rest until Balaraba is healed. The man her parents had chosen for her turns out to be the true love of her life.
The film poses questions for young lovers: what do you do when the woman you have sworn to love for an eternity becomes disfigured, or you discover she cannot have children? What does love mean in this case? Who is the true lover of Balaraba?  Other films ask similarly difficult questions, applicable to “real life.” In Sai Wata Rana, the luminous Nafisa Abdullahi is courted by the romantic but weak-willed Ali Nuhu, the charming but treacherous Lawan Ahmad, and finally the funny and self-sacrificing Adam Zango. As the film explores love from three different angles, it provides a warning to young women to be careful about who they allow to sweep them off their feet. Other films like Walli Jam ask questions about whether a girl can abandon her true love to marry an influential elder who will help convert an entire village to Islam. Zazzabi asks what happens to love when a disease like HIV comes between lovers.  Older films like Sarmadan or In da So Da Kauna point, like Romeo and Juliet, to the poisoned prejudices of the elders who come close to ruining their children’s lives.  These are not simple escapist romantic comedies, but searching dramas that force the audience to think and question and debate.  So while many Hausa romantic films may not have the generic tightness or polished sheen of Hollywood romances like 50 First Dates or 27 Dresses, ultimately, I find them more important.