Peruvian Mario Vargas Llosa Beats Kenyan Ngugi Wathiong’o to Nobel Prize

Celebrated Kenyan novelist Ngugi Wa Thiong’o has narrowly missed a chance to become the fifth African writer to win Nobel Prize for Literature. Peruvian writer, politician, essayist and journalist Mario Vargas Llosa has been declared the 2010 Nobel Prize Winner for Literature, beating Ngugi and a strong field of contestants that included US novelist Cormac McCarthy, Japanese writer Haruki Marukami and Swedish poet Tomas Tranströmer.

A Kenyan teacher, novelist, essayist, and playwright, Ngugi published his first novel, Weep Not, Child, in 1964, the first major novel in English by an East African. Over the years, he has continued to entertain his readers with his thought-provoking works that have seen him rank as one of the best post-independence African writers.

Ngugi Wathiong'o is one of Kenya's and Africa's best authors

The Nobel Committee awarded Vagas the prize "for his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual's resistance, revolt, and defeat", in an event that was held in the Swedish Academy in Stockholm. 

Had Ngugi scooped the award, he could have become only the fifth African to win the Nobel Prize for literature, and only the second Kenyan Nobel Prize winner after environmental and political activist Wangari Maathai was coveted with the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004.

Famous Nigerian playwright and dramatist, Wole Soyinka, was the first African Nobel Prize in Literature laureate when he was awarded the prize in 1986. Two years later in 1988, Egyptian born writer Naguib Mahfouz was awarded, before South Africa’s Nadine Gordimer and J.M. Coetzee won the award in 1991 and 2003 respectively.

Nigeria’s Wole Soyinka still remains the only black African to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Algeria-born Albert Camus was the first African-born Nobel winner for literature in 1955 though he did not win the award as an African. At only 44, Camus was the second-youngest recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature, after British author Rudyard Kipling who was 41.

The Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded 103 times to 107 Nobel Laureates between 1901 and 2010.

Ngugi had emerged as bookmakers' favourite to win the 2010 award.

Currently, he is a Distinguished Professor of the Departments of Comparative Literature and English at the University of California, Irvine. He was born in Kamiriithu village in Central Kenya in 1938, grew up during the second world war and was caught up in the Mau Mau uprising as a teenager. He received a B.A. in English from Makerere University College in Kampala, Uganda, in 1963.

While Ngugi was in Britain for the launch of the novel, he learned about a plot to eliminate him by Moi’s regime on his return. This forced him into exile and he only returned to Kenya in 2004 after twenty-two years absence. 

Nobel Literature Prize: The ten past winners
2010: Mario Vargas Llosa (Peru)
2009: Herta Mueller (Germany)
2008: Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio (France)
2007: Doris Lessing (Britain)
2006: Orhan Pamuk (Turkey)
2005: Harold Pinter (United Kingdom)
2004: Elfriede Jelinek (Austria)
2003: John M. Coetzee (South Africa)
2002: Imre Kertész (Hungary)
2001: Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul (United Kingdom)

Selected works by Ngugi Wathiong’o:

• The Black Hermit, 1963 (play)
• Weep Not, Child, 1964
• The River Between, 1965
• A Grain of Wheat, 1967 - Nisun jyvä (trans. by Seppo Loponen)
• This Time Tomorrow 1970
• Homecoming: Essays on African and Caribbean Literature, Culture, and Politics, 1972
• Secret Lives, and Other Stories, 1976
• The Trial of Dedan Kimathi, 1976 (with Micere Githae Mugo)
• Ngaahika ndeenda (I Will Marry When I Want), 1977 (play; with Ngugi wa Mirii)
• Petals of Blood, 1977
• Caitaani mutharaba-Ini (Devil on the Cross), 1980 - Paholainen ristillä (trans. by Mika Tiirinen)
• Writers in Politics: Essays, 1981
• Education for a National Culture, 1981
• Detained: A Writer's Prison Diary, 1981
• Barrel of a Pen: Resistance to Repression in Neo-Colonial Kenya, 1983
• Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature, 1986
• Mother, Sing For Me, 1986
• Njamba Nene and the Flying Bus (Njamba Nene na Mbaathi i Malhagu), 1986 (children's book)
• Matigari ma Njiruungi, 1987 - Matigari, (translated into English by Wangui wa Goro)
• Njamba Nene and the Cruel Chif (Njamba Nene na Chibu King'ang'i), 1988 (children's book)
• Njamba Nene's Pistol (Bathitoora ya Njamba Nene), 1990 (children's book)
• Moving the Centre: The Struggle for Cultural Freedom, 1993
• Penpoints, Gunpoints and Dreams: The Performance on Literature and Power in Post-Colonial Africa, 1998
• Wizard of the Crow: A novel, 2006 - Variksen velho (trans. by Seppo Loponen)

 And That's thesteifmastertake!!

Kenya Wins Swimming Gold, Sets Sight on Athletics

Kenya wins a rare gold in swimming competition, shifts attention to athletics.

Kenyan swimming sensation, Jason Dunford, has won the country her first medal in the ongoing Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India, after cruising to victory in the men's 50m butterfly. The 23-year old stopped the clock at 23.35, to beat Australia's Geoff Huegill with 0.02 seconds, while Roland Schoeman of South Africa came third.

Dunford has been in scintillating form en route to the final, beating world, Africa and Commonwealth record holder, Schoeman, twice in the preliminaries and semis.

Kenya had never won a medal in swimming at the Commonwealth Games before Dunford's heroic exploits.

Commonwealth Games opening ceremony in Delhi, India

However, the long and middle distance powerhouse will be looking to officially kickstart its medal haul today when the men’s 5000m final takes center stage in the ongoing 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India.

Although Kenya fielded a team in other 14 disciplines including swimming, boxing, squash, badminton, shooting among others, the country’s hopes are once again firmly on their track athletes who have never failed to perform when called upon.

2008 Beijing Olympics silver medalist and former World 5000m champion Eliud Kipchoge will lead Vincent Yator and Mark Kiptoo, inn their bid to complete a podium sweep for Kenya.

The Sky is the limit for Kenyan athletes

Ghana's Aziz Bakari will compete in the men's 100m heats in a fairly weak field that will be missing the lightening speed of 100m world record holder Usain Bolt and his compatriot and Melbourne gold medalist Asafa Powell.

South Africa, which topped Africa in the 2006 edition in Melbourne, Australia, sits first in Africa and fifth overall in the medals tally with 3 gold, 2 silver and 2 bronze. On Tuesday, Natalie du Toit stormed to victory in the 50m freestyle, in a games record of 29.17 seconds, to give the Rainbow nation her second gold after Chad le Clos had won the 200m men’s butterfly on Monday. Wrestlers, Richard Addinall and Hughes Bella-Lufi won the silver medals in the men’s 74kg and 96kg Greco-roman wrestling respectively, while the mens' 4x100m freestyle relay team won the bronze.

Nigeria is second in Africa and eighth overall with one gold, one silver and one bronze. Nwaokolo Augustina and Azike Onyeka won the gold and silver in the women’s 48kg and 53kg weightlifting competition respectively, while Joseph Romeo bagged the bronze in the men’s 60kg wrestling. Other African countries are yet to add their names in the medals table.

Kenya is now ranked third in Africa with Jason's gold.

The medals table however could change anytime, given that 28 medals will be up for grabs with 9 in aquatics, 4 in cycling, shooting and wrestling, 3 in athletics and 2 in both gymnastics and weightlifting.

The competition, which commenced on the 3rd of October amid controversy, is expected to draw to a conclusion on the 14th of October. Approximately 6081 athletes from 71 nations are participating in 17 sports.

Africa is represented by 19 countries. 

And That's thesteifmastertake!!

Nigeria - Nothing to Celebrate 50 Years Since Birth

Blast in one of Nigeria’s most important celebrations shows just how much the nation has failed to provide security and safety to her citizens.

Fifty years ago, an independent nation called Nigeria was born. 50 years ago, the baton of leading Africa’s populous nation was duly passed from James Robertson, the last British Governor-General of Nigeria to Tafawa Balewa, the first Prime Minister of Nigeria. 50 years ago, the British packed their bags and left Nigeria, perhaps never to return, and if they did, they needed a whole different game plan.

A brand new phoenix flag of green and white stripes was hoisted and the Union Jack, emblem of British suzerainty over Nigeria lowered for the umpteenth time amidst loud ululations, oomph, circumstance and unprecedented joy that so evidently painted the faces of an optimistic people.

Hopes of the new state, its leaders and people were sky high and many were hopeful that the newborn baby, Nigeria, which was ushered in a befitting morning breeze, would grow first enough and catapult herself into new levels of economic prosperity and tranquil living. After all, Nigeria was, and still is, the most populous nation in Africa with massive oil reserves.

But 50 years on, has any success worth celebrating been achieved? Has the massive oil production second to none in Africa been helpful to the over 150 million people?

Ask any Nigerian who was born pre or post the independence and you are likely to get a resounding and bold NO.

50 years after independence from the British colonial rule on October 1 1960, most Nigerians are actually asking themselves whether there is beauty in turning fifty and if achieving this milestone is worth popping up a champagne for. They are asking themselves whether the green-white-green flag has brought even a small level of success that was envisaged when the Union Jack was lowered for the last time. And what became of the vast oil reserves that were just beginning to be tapped after independence? How about that reassuring sense of optimism and pride that coursed gently through every nook and cranny of the West Africa nation and which knew no borders, either between tribes or religion?

Nigeria was once viewed as a Giant of Africa. But through the years, it has been working very hard to lose this colossal tagging, thanks mainly to military rules, corruption, violence in its oil-producing region in Niger Delta and inter-faith violence among other vices that have become synonymous with the West African superpower.

Some say that Nigeria needed to celebrate the 50 years of independence, not because of any tangible success but by the fact that it has managed to survive as a single state in the midst of deep splits along ethnic and religious lines. I tend to agree and so does the nation’s former President Olusegun Obasanjo who once said, “If in 50 years, we have remained one nation, it is a fair starting point of our celebration.”

It defies any form of logic and governance per se to even imagine how a functioning government can allow itself to be attacked by rebels on such an important day. Is it a case of failed systems of administration or is the Nigerian government’s security unit too naïve to deal with the Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta (MEND) rebel group which claimed responsibility for the attacks, that saw 12 lives lost and 8 others injured?

The bottom line is that the Nigerian government hit a new low after failing to protect her citizens who thronged the Eagle Square in Abuja to celebrate the country’s Golden Jubilee.

 Citizens are finding it ever more difficult to remain optimistic that things will change enough to earn Nigeria back its ‘Giant of Africa’ tag.  Nigeria’s golden goose, oil, has become more of a curse than anything. Like a bright petal on a withering flower that gradually dies leaving behind memories of potential but with no fruition in the end, the oil has just remained an economic-boom prospect, but which has brought more harm than good.

While the sitting President Goodluck Jonathan blamed the Friday bombings on “a small terrorist group that resides outside Nigeria that was paid by some people within to perpetrate the dastardly act,” one never fails to wonder just how many times Nigerian leaders will continue to blame some foreigners on its internal failures.  

But we all know that Nigeria is not about just gloom and doom. Some of the best literary writers in Africa are from Nigeria. Chinua Achebe and Wole Soyinka are just but two of Nigeria’s illustrious writers who have soared the art of literature in Africa to a whole new level. How about the film industry? Nigeria’s Nollywood is inarguably Africa’s premier film destination. Mention Nollywood to any African and names like Actress Genevieve Nnaji and actory, Ramsey Noah, who won the 2010 African Movie Academy Award for Best Actor, spring in the mind ‘pap’. Many other Nigerians are eking out a living out of the country’s film industry, thanks to what is perhaps missing in the political sphere – workable administrative systems devoid of corruption and self interests.

Just to conclude, Nigeria has absolutely nothing to celebrate at 50. Nothing.

And That's thesteifmastertake!!