A Bridge which encourages reading
and writing across Nigeria
One of the most formidable grant in
the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) since inception in 1981, is the
Yussuf Ali literary awareness grant. Set up in 2012 to cater for literary
awareness in Nigeria, the literary awareness grant is a three million
naira grant awarded every year to ANA, to create awareness of
reading and writing culture across Nigeria. This literary awareness grant is to
bridge the gap of reading and writing across Nigeria through ANA. The literary
awareness grant has being able to draw both young and old to the importance of
literature in Nigeria.
Architect of the literary grant Mr
Yussuf Ali, SAN, is one of the few Nigerians who has deemed it fit to see to
the growth and expansion of Nigerian literature.
The literary awareness grant has being taken to many states accross the federation. The campaign has been sustained and organised effectively by the commitment of the Association of Nigerian Authors and its Branches who have made sure that this literary awareness grant have reached the nook and crannies of many states.
Former Chairman ANA Lagos Mr Femi Onileagbon in a phone interview with WesternPost said the Yusuf Ali Grant is worthy of emulation, as he noted that, “One man can continue to pump such an amount into promoting literacy year in year out is worthy of praise.”
Onileagbon advised wealthy Nigerians to invest part of their immense wealth in encouraging reading, writing, and education generally in ANA which is for the well-being of the society.
Queens School Ilorin and Government Secondary School Mopo are some of the schools that have benefited from the Yusuf Ali literary awareness grant in Ilorin.
According to the Chairman of ANA Kwara chapter, Abdulrahman Aderinoye, said ANA Kwara has make sure that at least two new school benefit from the literary awareness grant every year, making sure it spread across the state which is a good reawakening of literature in the state by Yussuf Ali.
Methodist Grammar School Ibadan was one of the schools that benefited in the Yusuf Ali grant. In a phone chat with WesternPost Newspaper, Chairman of the chapter, Funsho Omotosho said Oyo State has benefited from the grant since it started.
Omotosho noted that the grant have being used for secondary schools in state noting, ‘Its a two way thing in Oyo, the grant is use to buy books from members, and then we distribute this books to schools. Student are then ask to read the books and prizes are distributed to encourage them.’
In 2015, the grant was applied by the then National Executive Council of ANA to host a workshop on fiction writing in Abuja in which about 25 students, drawn from tertiary institutions across the country via a competitive process, participated.
In 2016, the Denja Abdullahi-led National Executive Council of ANA took the literary awareness campaign a notch further by focusing on innovative literary awareness campaign among tertiary institutions across the country through the States’ chapters. Chapters submitted proposals on envisaged activities based on which they were assessed and sub-grants finally awarded to 16 chapters that met the provisioned requirements.
The grant, was used in 2017 to publish three children’s literature titles under the Nigerian Writers Series (NWS) which has been distributed to chapters of ANA Nationwide to powerANA‘s A-Book-A-Child nationwide project that was flagged off at the ANA ‘s 36th International Convention which held in Makurdi, Benue State in October, 2017.
“Oma The Drummer Queen”, was one of the literary works published with the Yussuf Ali grant under NWS. Salamatu Sule, author of the book did not just praise Yussuf Ali, she was grateful a beneficiary of literary awareness grant . Sule’s book was published when she was Secretary Abuja State chapter.
In Benue State the Yusuf Ali Grant reached the nooks and cranies of the state as the campaign was taken to major tertiary institutions in the state.
Chairman of the State Charles Lornumbe told WesternPost that Benue has benefitted from grant and ANA at the national level take note of chapters which are very committed to reading and writting and award them the grant.
He said, ANA Benue has benefitted two times ‘ I have being part of the executive before I became the chairman of ANA Benue. In 2015 when we got the grant we did a literary campaign for tetiary institution student and the launch was at college of Advanced and Professional studies Markurdi.Deputy Governor of Benue who is also passionate about literature also gave some token to the one hundred and fifty thousand naira which Benue Chapter got to promote literary awareness in the state.We went to college of education Gboko,we took the campaign also to College of Education katinala. ‘
The Yusuf literary awareness grant
reawakened literature in Benue State and that made them bid for the 2017 ANA
Convention which they got , Lornumbe noted.
No comments:
Post a Comment