The Arts-Muse Fair

Our Arts-Muse Fair Poet-Today's love for her fatherland is unmistakable. We see this in her laments of the state of her nation.     Senseless Heroes In just a day Hearts felt bitter, sunken and led astray Fathers have clumped their way out the city gates Singing songs and dragging sons along It is May! The rains have found a home among us and he is ready to stay Who then would plant our grains? Poor scanty fatherland running down its hay Brothers becoming brother’s own adversary Blindly following the path of a lost course They bought doomsday and Death is the price to pay. Returned We are back Thudding our way on the sore back of the aching earth It is our knack Generously inflicting oneself with flamboyant pains is our quest It is dark Hearts in dread yet glad. The earth is black And cold Tired of our aimless digging as if in search of gold. We lack Our sanity had betrayed us. Lunacy is our happy leader.

AMAB Books & Publishing, Minna and Home of Books Foundation, Lagos have announced a long list of 17 stories for the 2017 Nigerian Flash Fiction Contest. This year the organizers received 76 entries with equal balance of love stories, loneliness and longings, dystopianism, contemplation and other themes that reflect contemporary Nigerian situations after they had requested for stories woven around ‘abstraction and futurism’. All the 17 entries would undergo further scrutiny by the judges to bring out a shortlist of 7 by the end of July 2017. Prizes for the winner, 1 st Runner-up and 2 nd Runner-up are N100,000, N80,000 and N70,000 worth of books respectively. Judges for 2017 contest are - Abimbola Adelakun, University of Texas; Dr. Ismaila Bala, Bayero University, Kano; Uchechukwu Umezurike, University of Alberta and Adeola Opeyemi, Poet & Critic, Lagos. This is the long list of 17 in no particular order. Still Miracle by Michael Larry The

Anas Balarabe Yazid is an Academic and entrepreneur concerned with finding solutions to the problems of his community. He lives in Kano, the centre of Kannywood, the Hausa-themed film industry that is second to the Nollywood. Sales revenue from films is heavily diminished by piracy, which offers cheaper, bootlegged versions of the original films to the public. This shrinks investors’ returns on investment, voiding sales projections and boosting the pirates’ pockets. Certis , Mr. Yazid’s company has launched YodaCine , a new technological innovation to solve this age long problem of piracy. The Yoda innovation has already brought Mr. Yazid recognition from the British Council and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for its use in promoting schooling by providing access to books by pupils and students. Anas Yazid speaking at the launch of YodaCine last week in Kano Collaborating with Motion Picture Production Ltd, Certis created the Kannywood Box Off