GASAR RUBUTU DON TUNAWA DA BASHIR KARAYE

Malamai,

Tare da sallama. Ga wata gajeriyar sanarwa kan bikin gasar rubutun Hausa don tunawa da marigayi Injiniya Bashir Karaye, kashi na biyu.

Za a yi bikin fidda gwani na gasar ta bana a ranar 22 ga wannan watan na Oktoba, 2008a birnin tarayya, Abuja.

Majiya ta shaida mani cewa kwanan nan za a bayyana sunayen zakaru uku da su ka kai matakin karshe a gasar inda daga cikin su za a fidda gwani na gwanaye da bi masa/mata da kuma na uku.

Idan kun tuna, a bara, gogan naku ne ya zo na daya da littafin sa mai suna "'Yartsana," yayin da Balaraba Ramat Yakubu ta zo ta biyu, sannan Maje El-Hajeej Hotoro ya zo na uku.

Majiyar ta kara shaida mani cewa Dakta Ibrahim Malumfashi na Jami'ar Usmanu Danfodio shi ne Alkalin Alkalan gasar ta bana, wadda ita ma littattafan hikaya ne su ka shiga.

Idan ba a mance ba, maidakin marigayi Injiniya Karaye, wato Mrs Bilkisu A. Bashir, ita ce ta dauki nauyin gudanar da gasar.

Duk littafin da ya zo na daya za a ba shi N150,000; na biyu kuma N100,000, sannan na uku N50,000.

To, Allah Ya ba mai rabo sa'a.

To, kaka tsara kaka!! In ta bi ta daga-daga, na kurya ka sha kashi! Allah Ya nuna mana ranar, amin.

DEATH THREAT FROM KANO CENSORS

Religion aside, We respect ur person. We see u as patriotic Nigerian who also has d intrst of d North in his heart, hence ds call to put a stop to d activities of ur editor Sheme. His personal attack d censorship board in Kano is attack on Islamic moral values which d Board is protecting and it is doing a good job of it. We don't want to believe u hv a hand in ds, hence ds call to put a stop to it. We don't know what will happen if u do not, but we do know tht d u're putting d Leadership nwsppr on line as well as ur othr invstmnts. We don't know wht indvdl members of d Coalition will do, but I do know tht we've been restraining thm with effort. And these youth are very restive. A stitch in time...

------

MY COMMENT: My boss, Mr Sam Nda-Isaiah, the Chairman/Editor-in-Chief of Leadership newspaper, Abuja, which I edit, received this threat today. Later, I got a similar threat. Such threats were received by me since last Friday. One was also sent to Mr Nda-Isaiah before his present trip abroad. Apparently, someone is not happy with the paper's coverage of the activities of the Kano State Censorship Board, headed by Malam Abubakar Rabo Abdulkarim. Whoever it is thinks that the best way to stop or influence the coverage is to issue an anonymous death threat, waving the religion card. Honestly, I never realised that the coverage was having such a big impact on some fellow(s) as to attract such a commentary. I also do not believe that apart from keeping the issues of censorship in the news the coverage was unfair. For example, we always made efforts to get the two sides of the story at any time. Mal Rabo was interviewed, at my behest, by all the media in which I have interest. His actions and utterences were always reported very well. We may have disagreed with some aspects of his methods, but not the idea of sanitising society. So why all the fuss? A friend has asked me the question today: "Don't you think Rabo was the one behind the text message?" I do not know how to answer the question very well except to say: But who gives life? Allah. Who takes it? Allah.

Censorship in Kano

Some Preliminary Thoughts





I have restrained myself from commenting on the new regime of censorship in Kano (the latest I mean, which affects writers) because I had wanted to study the trend of opinion among the writers themselves. Being an author, my first reaction was one of anger, anger against those that work to emasculate intellectualism in Hausa land.

Kano is too important to ignore when it comes to intellectualism and creativity. It is the hub of intellectualism in Hausa land - an enviable position it seized from my native Katsina State. It is as the saying goes - when Kano sneezes, other Hausa cities catch cold immediately. Little surprise, then, that when movie making was banned for six months last year, the ripples were felt all over Northern Nigeria.

I have found myself caught between the extremes of the two stages of censorship unfurled by the Kano State Censorship Board. As a filmmaker myself, and publisher of the leading Hausa movie magazine, I was directly affected by the ban on moviemaking and the subsequent measures that were announced with the clear (though hidden) motive of emasculating the young, albeit vibrant film industry. Many of my close friends were affected; they were thrown out of work. I knew that most of them depended on the movie market to fend for themselves and even feed their kith and kin. They thus added to the army of the unemployed in Kano State. The government of Governor Ibrahim Shekarau (pictured above) has done little to reduce poverty through job-creation for the youths. I was told it employed many driving the A Daidaita Sahu motor-scooters and others in serving the quasi-police agency Hisba. But by banning filmmaking, it created a big market of unemployed youths, this time with young girls as half of the number of victims.

The level of discontent among the populace is unquantifiable.

Now that the censors are preparing to punish unregistered authors, I am caught in the centre again. Being a Hausa author myself (NB: I won the biggest Hausa writers' award with my novel "'Yartsana'), I felt doubly certain that part of the new legislation was directed at me! Of course, I am not the sole target. Everyone else is a target. In fact, I could even be considered a distant target, having not depend on book writing for a living. But the truth is that any writer worth his salt on the globe is a victim of the attack on creativity by a regime anywhere on earth.

The censors have no moral standing to prescribe a moral yardstick for authors because if they were to be judged using the same yardstick, many of them would be sent to jail first. The kind of stories one gets to hear about government officials in Kano, many of them verifiable, you would be at your wit's end trying to decipher the purpose of the current onslaught. Here are people who have failed to provide basic amenities for the common people, but they are using religion to attack others.

Can't those victimised use religion to fight back? This question is important in settling scores in the matter. No government official should consider himself holier than the next person just because he has money to employ hungry malams as radio propagandists. For, religious sentiments were used copiously to overcome filmmakers. The same sentiments have begun to be used by Malam Abubakar Rabo, the Director-General of the Censorship Board, against the authors. In the coming weeks and months, be sure to hear him on radio and TV using moral dogma to belittle and tar the authors.

The Hausa writers should not fear to fight this war. They should assemble their own Qur'anic surahs and the Prophetic hadiths against the unjust rulers and pretenders in order to defend themselves. They should visit radio and TV stations to speak out. They may be gagged there because government happens to be the biggest advertiser, but then they should use the independent media all over the world to expose the hypocrisy embedded in the ongoing war against intellectualism. Their war should be waged against the avalanche of intolerance and insensitivity which seems to be increasingly cultivated by some minority elements within the Kano State government.

They may not be rich enough in material resources to fight, but their ideas and their tenacity of purpose will be of great benefit to them. They are going to be supported by all persons of conscience. They should watch out against fifth columnists among themselves who shall be easily bought with cheap porridge by the censors.

Above all, they should be consoled by the knowledge that power is transient. Shekarau and all those book burners will not be in power forever. By 2011 there shall be a general election and Shekarau will not only go away but also fade away like an old tale. Even if he manages to plant a lackey/stooge as the next state governor, he would not have the guarantee that his interests would be safeguarded perpetually. It happened in Zamfara and many other states of the federation. And even if his stooge remains loyal to him, that stooge would one day leave. Remember that Dr Rabi'u Musa Kwankwaso, whom he defeated in 2003, was the most powerful governor Kano ever had, but where is he now? Is he not in the Siberia of political power even though he had been rewarded with a ministerial post by Obasanjo?

How I wish I could join this war. But I will not. I have only expressed my mind - for the records. My weapons shall remain in their armoury because I have friends in the Kano government. My heart will, however, remain with my friends the authors and the filmmakers. If the war degenerates, I shall fight. But on a different pitch from where both the dog the monkey shall be bloodied.

I have spoken. Ma'assalam.

Saadou “Bori” Abdullahi – Pioneering Innovator of Hausa Disco Music

By Prof. Abdalla Uba Adamu
Chairman, Center for Hausa Cultural Studies,
Kano, Nigeria



It was with absolute shock and sadness that I learnt of the death of Saadou, the Nigeriene modern Hausa musician along Maiduguri road on Thursday 26th June 2008. He was returning from a concert which he gave in Maiduguri.

Saadou, born in 1966 in Niger Republic was best known as Saadou Bori, after his best selling solo album, Bori, released on tape in Nigeria in 1990. I learnt of the tape, and subsequently the musician, after I returned from US where I rediscovered African music. On returning to Kano, I made a direct beeline for the Bata roundabout where a series of Nigerienes keep shops selling music and video items from Francophone Africa. Amidst the tapes of Ami Koita, Nodibo Kone, Zoni Diabate, Salif Keita, Ali Farka Toure, Oumou Sangare, Djenba Seck, Kandia Kouyate, and Inna Baba Coulibaly, there sits Saadou’s Bori – standing as the one out of the mélange of Malian wassolou singers and African blues guitarists.

Bori turned out to be the biggest selling tape-album of 1990 in Kano and other parts of Hausa northern Nigeria. It came at a time when there was simply no Hausa modern music. And the traditional music was relegated to the background of aristocratic palaces and the elegant edifices of the fabulously wealthy merchant class.

Modern music in northern Nigeria was introduced by non-Hausa artistes such as I.K. Dairo and His Blue Spots (Tuwo Da Miya, Mu Tafi Damaturu) in the 1960s. In The Sudan, the Hausa diva, Aisha Fallatiya, demonstrated the power of women in modern Hausa music with Muna Maraba da Sardauna Sakkwato, a welcome song composed for the then Premier of Northern Nigeria, Alhaji (Sir) Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto on a State Visit to the country. Backed by the “sound of Sudan”—predominantly string quartet of sorts with an accordion, and as popularized by Sudanese male singers such as Hamza Kalas—Fallatiya’s lyrics—sung in Hausa, found a ready niche in the radio plays and urban clubs of northern Nigeria. Some musicians merely use Islamic iconography to appeal to Muslim Hausa club punters. For instance, Ofo & The Black Company’s Allah Wakbarr (sic) as well as I.K. Dairo’s Hungry for Love endeared themselves to Hausa Muslim listeners due to their use of religious expressions. Ofo’s composition consists of repeated chanting of “Allah Akbar” accompanied by a scintillating funk guitar rhythm, while Dairo’s more sober high-life approach was captured in the initial start of Hungry for Love with the lyrics, “Wayyo Allah (Hau. Oh my God), I feel hungry, not for food, but for love” repeated over and over.

The 1970s brought more Hausa modern music principally from Ghana and Niger Republic. In Ghana Sidiku Buari—trained as a professional musician in the U.S.—pioneered the Hausa disco sound as in his debut album Buari—a composition straight out of Kool and the Gang, Ohio Players, The Fatback Band, Earth Wind and Fire, Chic and Brass Construction disco sound of the 1970s. This was sustained much later by Maurice Maiga with Kudan Gida (Hau. housefly) employing disco and highlife sound of Ghana and Togo.

In northern Nigeria modern Hausa music was pioneered by Hausa Christian entertainers such as Bala Miller & The Great Pirameeds of Africa and Sony Lionheart – both from Zaria. With extensive Church training in the use of guitars and the organ, their preferred musical language was Hausa, if only to indicate that not all Hausa are Muslim and not all Hausa musical entertainment is based on Hausa indigenous instruments. Bala Miller’s compositions such as Sardauna Macecinmu (Sardauna our Savior), Karya Ba ta Ta Shi (The lie does not last), Ikon Allah (The will of God) and Sony Lionheart’s Zaman Duniya (This life) became club anthems particularly in Kano, Kaduna and Jos. These modern Hausa musical traditions were sustained in clubs by small bands around Jos and Kaduna such as The Elcados and Super Ants who although predominantly singing in English, nevertheless forayed into Hausa lyrics—all using what can be called domesticated Hausa soul music, with not a single indigenous instrument – kalangu, sarewa, kukuma, kakaki, kwarya, shantu, etc – in sight. The mainstream Hausa youth soon became consumers to these globalizing currents, preferring them, in most part over “the real” music from African American stars. I remember our attempts to copy the Elcados sounds at the Kano State College of Advanced Studies Auditorium in the early 1970s with Yusuf AbdulLateef, trying to create a “Kano modern” sound – which did not work out at all!

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Funmi Adams caused a massive sensation in uniquely adapting a Hausa folktale – Labarin Gizo da Koki (Story of the Gizo the Spider and his wife) – to modern music. What made it more enchanting was a video clip that accompanied the audio tape, giving a rich background to the simple tale of morality for young children.

This fusion music, interestingly enough, was not wholly embraced as an entertainment form by mainstream Hausa youth. This was caused by two factors. The first was the religious and cultural divide. The modernized “Hausa” music of non-ethnic Hausa was seen predominantly as “Christian” and “southern” Nigerian (kade-kaden ‘yan kudu). Secondly, such musical adaptation appealed basically to club circuit patrons—an exclusive class of civil servants far removed from the street level reality of urban youth.

Hausa traditional musicians had always occupied a lowbrow status as maroka (praise-singers) and this had the effect of discouraging the musicians from either training their own children into the craft—for it is considered an occupational craft—or even encouraging “students” to learn the craft and sustain it (rarely do Hausa occupational and craft guilds accept outsiders, are referred to as “shigege”_. A typical example is this response by Alhaji Sani Dan Indo, a kuntigi musician who responded to a question on whether he wanted his children to succeed him:

Unless it is absolutely necessary. I definitely don’t want my son to become a musician. I have seen enough as a musician to determine that my son will really suffer if he becomes a praise-singer. You only do praise-singing music to a level-headed client, and it is only those who know the value of praise-sing that will patronize you. Those times have passed. I certainly would not want my own son to inherit this business. I would prefer he goes to school and get good education, so that even after I die, he can sustain himself, but I don’t want him to follow my footsteps, because I really suffered in this business. Therefore I am praying to Allah to enable all my children to get education, because I don’t want them to become musicians like me. (Interview with Sani Dan Indo, a Hausa popular culture kuntigi musician, Annur, Vol 1, August 2001, p. 48).

However, Saadou changed this perception with the release of the tape-album, Bori (Hau. Spirit possession ceremony of the traditional Hausa) in around 1991, earning him a nickname, as he subsequently became known as Saadou Bori.

The tape-album was a mega hit in northern Nigeria. Filled with heavy disco funk and Jazz rhythms, and with tracks sung almost entirely in Hausa language, it proved for Hausa musicians on both sides of the postcolonial divide that Hausa music can be “modernized”, indeed evidenced by the fact that in 1994 Saadou teamed up with Moussa Poussy and released an extended version of Bori as Niamey Twice.

Saadou’s Bori – The New Age Hausa Disco Sound

Bori redefined Hausa dance music and provided a paradigm shift in the evolution of modern Hausa music. Not only does it provide a dance floor series of numbers, it also neatly meshed modern with traditional in its lyrical forms. Maintaining a heavy disco beat in all the compositions, it uses elements of Hausa call-and-response mechanism in many of the lyrical renditions, where a choir of female (‘yan amshi) echo a specific refrain.

The tape-album version of Bori had eight tracks: Side 1 – Dango, Yelleru, Badossa, and Boudje; Side 2 – Hadiza, Bori, Soyeyya, Maidawa.
Of these eight tracks, two became Saadou Bori’s “bakandamiya” (defining masterpiece) and ultimately signature tune. These were Yelleru (from Side 1), and Hadiza (Side 2). Both were well composed with tight horns and musical arrangement. Yelleru offered a new perspective to Hausa fusion music because it contained lyrics in pulaa (Fulfulde language of the Fulbe). Simple and catchy, it tells the story of a how the economic hardships befell the Fulbe who may have to give up their cattle and nomadic lifestyles for a settled farm life. A pure dance floor composition, it contain at least three midsections that provided the backing musicians opportunities to display their skills with drums and horns.

Hadiza hit the spot more directly with Hausa women. It tells the story of a new bride (amarya) in a two-wife household. The song extols the virtues of the amarya thus:

Kai mata, Oh, women
A rike darajar aure da kyau Hold fast to the values of marriage
A bar hushi da ikon Allah Stop being annoyed with Allah’s will
Dan ikon Allah ya wuce hushi For all that Allah wills is beyond your anger

Zama da kishiya tilas ne Living with a co-wife is inevitable
Ba don Uwargida na so ba And not because the Senior wife wants it

Gyara gida, Hadiza Look after the house
Duk na ki ne It is all with your purview
Gyara wuri, Hadiza Fix the places in the house
Duk na ki ne It is all with your purview
Gyara wurin ki, Hadiza Fix your own apartment
Duk na ki ne It is all with your purview
To ladabi biyayya With respect and obedience
Duk na ki ne It is all with your purview

Ki ba ni ruwa, Hadiza, Fetch water for me, Hadiza
Sai ta durkusa She brings it and courtesies
Ki ba ni hwura, Hadiza, My porridge, Hadiza
Sai ta durkusa She brings it and courtesies
Ki ba ni tuwo, Hadiza Bring my dinner, Hadiza
Sai ta durkusa She brings it and courtesies
Ruwan wanka, Hadiza, Fix my bath, Hadiza
Sai ta durkusa She brings it and courtesies

This song created three mixed reactions. The feminists hated it because it was a reaffirmation of what some of the more militant amongst them perceived as the servitude of women in a male dominated society. Similarly, Senior wives were not too keen on it because it is like rubbing salt in the wound – first being told they have to live with a co-wife, and second the beautiful virtues of the co-wife are being extolled; as if they were the opposites of their own behavioral patterns. A third reaction was from young male husbands who took to playing the song with glee (and I am speaking from an ethnographic experience!) whenever the Senior wife and their amarya are together.

The title track from the tape-album, Bori, is a celebration of the Hausa bori cult medicine. However, it was very clear from the lyrics that Saadou perceived bori not as a form of worship, but as pure entertainment – a process more related to its actual function.

Mace kucaka ba ta bori, A woman of easy virtue does not do the bori
Mace kazama ba ta bori A slovenly woman does not do the bori

Iya bori abin (wa) tsoro Bori is truly frightening
Aljani abin (wa) tsoro Sprits are frightening

Kai bori manyan sarakai Bori really is for important people
Yara kanana ba su yi nai Children cannot do it
Ali aboki na na da bori Ali my friend does it
Kai Bello aboki na na da bori Bello, my friend does it
Ee, Madu aboki na na da bori Yes, Madu my friend does it
Ee, ni na sa kai na bori Yes, I have the bori

In these lyrics – which appeared in a different sequence in the song from here – the stereotypes of bori amongst the Hausa are being reversed. Suddenly, it is glamorous to be a “bori” – evidenced by singer himself. Even album cover photo of the singer – wearing a headband made from cowry shells, one of the many unknown hallmarks of bori practitioners – speaks volumes about bori as an entertainment, rather than a serious religious advocacy of the traditional Hausa cultural anthropology.

Saadou subsequently released other tape-albums, but none had the stunning success of Bori, which even won an award in Niger republic during a festival of Hausa modern music (although I can’t recall the year). In place of the tape-albums — which were easy targets for pirates anyway – he spent the last few years working on what I call the “ceremony circuit”, putting shows for “big” people (politicians and other rich people) during the wedding ceremonies of their children.

Saadou was an innovative songwriter, arranger and vocalist. His creative works appeared in the slack transition period between the when Christian and mainly southern Nigerian musicians used the Hausa language to appeal to the Muslim Hausa (from the 1960s to end of 1980s), and when the video film soundtrack genre (called Nanaye – term for female children’s playground songs – because of its predominant gender base and call-and-response structure must use female voices) emerged from mid 1990s.

With the death of Bala Miller in February 2003, Saadou indeed represented the last breed of truly innovative Hausa musicians and composers with a focus on using real instruments to present their craft. In the mid 1990s, the Yamaha synthesizer became available to the young Hausa filmmakers interested in reproducing the multi-instrument sound similar to that of Hindi films which Hausa filmmakers avidly and religiously appropriate into Hausa language versions. With neither skills to compose music, nor understanding of the relationship between the different musical instruments and sounds, the new breed of musicians rely heavily on sound samples stored in the synthesizers, and the sequencing facility provided to arrange tunes to produce a melody.

In this respect, and without any formal music curricula in the schools for the teeming Hausa Nanaye composers, Saadou Bori remained the last of the great composers of Hausa modern music on World Music level. He practiced music with the true attention to detail of a professional composer and arranger – aware of the relationships between tune and harmony; and inter-twining Hausa mindsets and world views in his lyrics.

Saadou “Bori” Abdullahi was born in Maradi, Niger Republic in 1966. He died in June 2008 in Maiduguri, Nigeria. He is survived by one wife and five children. He will be surely missed as an innovator in modern Hausa disco music.

GASAR N300,000 GA MARUBUTAN HAUSA

Daga Ibrahim Sheme, Abuja

AN dad'e ba a samu tagomashi a fagen rubutun Hausa ba, musamman na k'irk'ira. An bar marubuta kowa tasa ta fisshe shi. Hakan yana tattare da matsaloli da dama, ta yadda littattafan mu sun kasance cikin k'ask'anci, babu inganci, kuma babu k'ok'arin kawo sabon abu. Idan ba a yi wankiyar finafinan Indiya da na Turawa da na ’yan Kudu ba, to kuwa za a d'auki littattafan su a fassara, a sata, a ce na Hausa ne.

To, da alama zamanin ci-gaba ya fara kunno kai a fagen rubutu. Wata mata da ke zaune a Abuja, kuma babbar ma’aikaciyar gwamnatin tarayya, ta d'auki nauyin shirya gasar rubuta littattafan Hausa daga bana, kuma za ta ba da zunzurutun kud'i har naira dubu d'ari uku (N300,000) ga zakarun gasar a kowace shekara.

Wannan mata dai sunan ta Hajiya Bilkisu Abdulmalik Bashir, kuma ita ce Babbar Sakatare ta Hukumar Kula da Aikin Shari’a ta Tarayya (Executive Secretary, National Judicial Service Commission). Ta d'auki nauyin gasar, abin da a Turance ake kira endowment, a dalilin son tunawa da mijin ta, wanda Allah ya yi wa rasuwa a ran 18 ga Oktoba, 2006. Mijin nata dai shi ne Injiniya Bashir K'araye, wanda ya tab'a zama Kwamishinan Albarkatun Ruwa na Jihar Kano, sa’annan ya tab'a zama Kwamishinan Yad'a Labarai, Matasa da Al’adu da Wasanni na jihar. Can a baya kuma ya tab'a zama shugaban Hukumar Muhalli ta Jihar Kano.

Rasuwar Injiniya Bashir ta girgiza iyalan sa da masoyan sa matuk'a, musamman da yake ta zo ne ba zato ba tsammani; cikin awoyi kad'an ya kwanta ciwo, kafin ka ce kwabo ya ce ga garin ku. Shekarun sa 56 a duniya.

A ranar Talatar nan da ta wuce, Hajiya Bilkisu ta fad'a wa membobin K'ungiyar Marubuta ta Nijeriya (Association of Nigerian Authors, ANA), reshen Babban Birnin Tarayya, da manema labarai, a ofishin ta a Abuja cewa marigayin mutum ne mai k'aunar harkar adabi da inganta harshen Hausa matuk'a. Don haka abin alfahari ne da farin ciki a gare ta a ce ta karrama shi ta hanyar saka gasar rubuce-rubucen Hausa da sunan sa.

Sunan wannan gasa dai Engineer Bashir K'araye Memorial Prize in Hausa Literature.

K'ungiyar ANA reshen Abuja, a k'ark'ashin jagorancin shugaban ta, Dakta Emman Usman Shehu, ita ce ta rubuta wa Hajiya Bilkisu takarda, ta buk'ace ta da ta d'auki nauyin gasar bayan sun fahimci cewa a shirye take da ta karrama marigayi ta kowace kyakkyawar hanya. Wani ma’aikacin hukumar, Inyamiri, mai suna Mista Patrick Oguejiofor, wanda shi ma marubuci ne, shi ne ya yi wa ’yan k'ungiyar hanya ya sada su da Hajiya har wannan al’amari ya tabbata.

A ranar Talatar makon jiya, an taru ne a ofishin Babbar Sakataren domin a k'addamar da fara wannan gasa. ’Ya’yan ANA a wurin sun had'a da shi Dakta Shehu da sakataren k'ungiya Mista Kanico da lauya Ahmed Maiwada da Mista Oguojifor da kuma Ibrahim Sheme, wanda ya tab'a zama sakataren yad'a labarai na k'asa na k'ungiyar ANA.

Ba wani shagali aka yi ba. An dai yi bayanai da kuma mik'a takardun da ke nuna cewa Hajiya ta d'auki nauyin wannan gasa.

Hajiya Bilkisu ta ce Mista Oguojifor ne ya ba ta k'warin gwiwa ta d'auki nauyin shirya gasar. Ta ce duk da yake ita ba marubuciya ba ce kuma ba ta samu isassshen lokacin karanta littattafai a yanzu, a shirye take ta yi dukkan abin da ya dace don tunowa da Injiniya Bashir. Ta ce, “Na kuma samu k'arin farin ciki da na ji cewa ba ku da wani wanda ya d'auki nauyin shirya gasa don hab'aka adabin Hausa. Sai na ga wannan babbar dama ce a gare ni in taimaka a hab'aka Hausa, wato harshen da shi (Injiniya Bashir) yake matuk'ar so.”
Ta k'ara da cewa Hausa harshe ne mai albarka. “Na yi mamaki da na ji cewa wai babu wani wanda ya d'auki nauyin hab'aka shi ta irin wannan hanyar. To, na yi murna da cewa ina daga cikin wad'anda za su taimaka wajen d'aukar nauyi irin wannan.”

A wajen amsa tambayoyin da ’yan jarida suka yi mata, Hajiya Bilkisu ta bayyana cewa ita kan ta dai ba Bahaushiya ba ce (an ce ’yar Jihar Kogi ce), to amma tana da kishin Hausa matuk'a, kuma mijin ta ya sha ba ta k'warin gwiwa wajen fahimtar harshen. Ta ce, “Duk da yake ni ba k'wararriya ba ce wajen magana da Hausa, amma dai na iya Hausa sosai.”

Cikin alhini, har ta kusa fashewa da kuka, Hajiya Bilkisu ta k'ara da cewa Injiniya Bashir mutum ne mai son karanta Hausa, kuma ya kan ba iyalan sa – daga matan sa har ’ya’yan sa – k'warin gwiwar su rik'a amfani da harshen. “Na tabbatar kowa da kowa (a gidan) zai ji dad'in cewa za a iya yin wani abu wanda marigayi ke so ko da bayan ran sa,” inji ta. “Shi ba marubuci ba ne, amma yana son inganta harkar rubutu. Duk wad'annan abubuwan su ne suka ba ni tunanin cewa lallai ya kamata in yi wannan abu.”

A yanzu dai ba a bayar da sanarwar fara gasar ba. To amma shugaban ANA na Abuja, Dakta Shehu, ya d'an nuna yadda gasar za ta kasance. Na farko dai k'ungiyar za ta zauna ta fito da k'a’idojin gasar, sannan za ta nad'a alk'alan gasar; za a bayar da sanarwa a kafafen yad'a labarai ana kira ga marubuta da su shiga gasar. Ya ce za a shigar da littattafan hikaya wad'anda aka buga su daga shekaru biyar da suka gabata zuwa yanzu a gasar. A cikin littattafan, za a zab'i guda uku a matsayin zakaru, za a shirya k'warya-k'waryar walima a Abuja wajen watan Nuwamba mai zuwa inda za a mik'a wa zakaru kyautar da suka ci ta wad'annan kud'i da za a karkasa masu.

“A bana, za mu fara ne da littattafan hikaya,” inji Dakta Shehu, “sannan a bad'i za mu saka gasar rubutattun wak'ok'i, sannan a shekara ta gaba kuma za mu yi gasar wasan kwaikwayo.”

“Muna kuma fatan fito da wasu abubuwan da za su k'awata gasar,” inji shi.

Wakilin mu ya fahimci cewa idan Hajiya Bilkisu ta ba da mak'udan kud'in shirya gasar, za a saka su a wani asusu na musamman a banki, inda a duk shekara za a ciri _300, 000 na zakaru, kuma akwai yiwuwar cewa kud'in za su k'aru a nan gaba.

Marubuta sun yi farin ciki da wannan abu da ya faru. Dakta Emman Shehu ya bayyana cewa wannan ba k'aramin k'ok'ari ba ne Hajiya Bilkisu ta yi.
Shi ma tsohon shugaban k'ungiyar ANA reshen Jihar Kano, wanda kuma fitaccen marubuci ne kuma malami a Jami’ar Bayero ta Kano, wato Dakta Yusuf Muhammad Adamu, ya yaba da k'ok'arin da Hajiya Bilkisu ta yi. A hirar da ya yi da Leadership Hausa shekaranjiya, malamin ya ce an jima ba a samu irin wannan lagwada ba a fagen rubutu “duk da k'ok'arin da muka sha yi na neman wanda zai d'auki nauyin irin wannan gasa.”

Ya yaba wa k'ungiyar ANA ta Abuja saboda hob'b'asan da suka yi na samun wannan taimako ga marubuta. Ya yi nuni da cewa shirya gasar zai ba da gagarumar gudunmawa ga k'ok'arin da ake yi na inganta rubutun Hausa.

Dakta Yusuf Adamu ya kuma ba da shawarar cewa ya kamata a d'auki alk'alan da suka dace don yin hukunci a gasar, ya ce “kada a d'auki wad'anda suke da wani ra’ayi na son rai.” Ya kawo misali da malamai a jami’o’in Bayero, A.B.U. Zariya da kuma Danfodiyo Sakkwato, wad'anda suka jima suna koyar da adabi tare da yin nazarin sa. Ya ce kuma a had'a da tsofaffin marubuta maza da mata don a tabbatar da adalci a gasar.

Damina ta iso Kano

Allah mai iko! A yau dai an kwarara ruwan sama na farko a birnin Kano. An soma ruwan ne jim kadan bayan magariba kuma an yi shi har zuwa wajen bayan isha'i. Ni kai na na sha dukan ruwan duk da yake a mota na ke (na bar gidan su marubuciya Maryam Ali Ali tare da aboki na Isiaka Aliagan, wanda ya wallafa mata littafin ta na "Faces of Naira," na tafi in kai shi Unguwa Uku shi da wani kanen sa. Tilas ta sa mu ka rika bude gilashin motar, ruwa na dan shigowa).

Kai! Amma dai mazauna birnin Dabo sun sha zafi a cikin 'yan kwanakin nan. Har ina cewa rabo na da jin zafin gari irin na bana, an dad'e! Kusan kowa a Kano addu'a ya ke yi Allah ya kawo ruwan sama. Kuma an shafe kwanaki da dama mu na jin labarin cewa an yi ruwa a gari kaza ko a gari kaza (misali, an yi ruwa mai yawa a Kaduna jiya). A Kano, da kyar mutum ke iya yin barci da dare saboda matsanancin zafi. Wani aboki na marubuci cewa ya yi shi dai duk da yake ba mai son esi ba ne, to amma zai yi kokari ya sayi esi don magance wannan d'an karen zafi da ake yi. Ni ma a yau da rana, lokacin da na ke cin abinci, na fad'a wa maidaki na cewa, "Sam ba na jin dadin cin abinci cikin 'yan kwanakin nan, duk na yi losing appetite. Na kan dai ci abinci ne kamar wani patient!"

Wani abin mamaki shi ne, Kano ta samu sanyin yanayi sosai. A yanzu haka da na ke wannan rubutun, ina d'an yin rawar d'ari. Ina jin ba zan ma iya barci ba sai na d'an sha shayi. Dan'adam kenan! Allah ba ya iya masa! Sai ka ce ba 'yan awoyi kadan da su ka gabata ba ne mu ke kukan zafi, yanzu kuma za mu fara kukan sanyi ya yi yawa! Allah, ka gafarce mu.

Ko banza dai a yau mutum zai kwanta ya yi barci a cikin sakewa. Kila har da minshari da tattake mayafi.

Ya Allah! Yadda mu ka ga farkon wannan damina, Ka sa mu ga karshen ta lafiya, amin. Ka sa wannan damina ta kasance mai albarka ga kasar mu baki day, amin.