Kendeka Prize for African Literature for African Writers 2022

Entries are invited from African writers for the Kendeka Prize for African Literature 2022.

This Prize will be awarded for the best piece of unpublished short story, either fiction or creative non-fiction. The prize aims at giving African writers, especially the unpublished a platform on which to show case their work. Through this platform more people will have access to their work which will in turn inspire more writing.

Through this Prize, Africans will have an opportunity of not only telling their own stories, but the freedom of telling them, as they are. This is because for a long time, the ‘African Story’ has been told by foreigners, a people who purport to know Africa. They have ended up with a story of Africa, a single story of a hungry, warring, ailing and backward people, a story of a continent full of calamities. This is their new version of the story of the Dark Continent!

This kind of African story is what Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie warns against and calls it ‘The Danger of a Single Story’. She goes on to tell us “That when we reject the single story, when we realize that there is never a single story about any place, we regain a kind of paradise”. This is the paradise that Kendeka Prize for African Literature aims at regaining.

About Kendeka Prize

Kendeka Prize for African Literature is a Non-Profit Company Limited by Guarantee registered in Kenya whose main objective, aim, vision and mission is to nurture new and existing writers from the African Continent and  the Diaspora by creating a platform for Africans to tell their stories not only on the Continent but to reach wider audiences around the world. The Prize encourages upcoming writers to write on issues affecting Africa from an African perspective thereby amplifying African voices worldwide. Many upcoming and existing African writers face challenges in publication and dist...... read more

Kendeka Prize for African Literature

Aim and Benefits of Kendeka Prize for African Literature

• The first prize will be KShs.100,000 while the 2nd and the 3rd  shall receive Kshs 50,000 and 25,000 for respectively.
• The remaining two of the five shortlisted stories shall receive KShs 5,000 each.

Requirements for Kendeka Prize for African Literature Qualification

• Entrants must be born in, or are citizens of any African country.
• The deadline for submissions is midnight 5th 2022.
• One entry per writer.
• Manuscripts should be of between 3000 and 5000 words.
• All entries must be in English.
• Entries should be attached in Microsoft Word or Rich Text format, with the title of the story as the file name.
• The first page of the story should include the title of the story and number of words.
• The entry must be typed in Times New Roman 12 point font with 1.5 line spacing.
• Entrants agree that the prize organizers may publicize the fact that a story has been entered, long listed, or shortlisted or won the prize.
• An author of a long-listed story agrees to its inclusion in the anthology, and to work with the editors to get the story ready for publication.
• the long listing of a story is not a guarantee that the story shall be included in the anthology
• The winner, first and second runners up in the Kendeka Prize 2021 are not eligible.
• Every author confirms that the submission is their original work, it has not been published anywhere else, and that it has not been long listed in this prize or in any other prize.
• The entrant gives exclusive global print and digital rights to Solano Publications Ltd for the long-listed stories for publication in an anthology. The author retains the copyright.
• The judges’ decision is final.

Interview date, Process and Venue for Kendeka Prize for African Literature

The entries will be read and analyzed. A long list shall be published in an anthology titled I Am Listening later in year. Judges and the date of the award ceremony will be announced in a later date.

Application Deadline

How to Apply

• Entries must be sent as attachments to the email [email protected]
• The email to which the story is attached must include the legal name of the writer, telephone number, a short Bio, age, and country of residence.

For more details, visit Kendeka Prize website.