Afritondo, a prominent media and publishing platform dedicated to amplifying the voices of Africans and black minority groups worldwide, has unveiled the shortlist for its highly anticipated 2025 Short Story Prize.
The shortlisted writers for the 2025 Afritondo Short Story Prize include JAY Lit contributor, Mustapha Enesi. The full list is as follows:
- Efua Boadu for ‘The Twenty-Eighth Day’ (Ghana / United Kingdom)
- Mustapha Enesi for ‘Mrs Coker and the Headless Masquerade’ (Nigeria)
- Emelda Nyaradzai for ‘Gwitimah Bible Blues’ (Zimbabwe / Canada)
- Gift Nyoni ‘Heat’ (Zimbabwe / United Kingdom)
- Zoe Ngombane ‘To my right, the ocean, to my left, the hills’ (South Africa)
Deeply impressed by the quality and range of the submissions, the judges—Rémy Ngamije, Ama Asantewa Diaka, and Umar Turaki in their words:
“The stories on this year’s shortlist display an exceptional mastery of language and craft—there is no doubt that African storytelling is a fully-fledged discipline with nuance and style. The writers whose short stories have been curated here display not only the present and healthy state of creative writing from Africa and its diaspora but also hint at its future as the gateway to exploring world-shaping things like migration and movement, family and belonging, the mystic and the unknown, and the possibilities of connection and redemption.”
The Afritondo short story prize is an annual literary prize awarded to a writer who possesses literary expertise and unique storytelling skills. The 2025 edition revolved around the theme “masks.” writers were expected to creatively interpret the theme and explore the spiritual, cultural and ethical reasons why masks are worn.
Shortlisted writers received 100 USD dollars while the final winner will receive 1000 USD dollars.
The winner of the 2025 Afritondo Short Story Prize will be announced on May 9, 2025.
Congratulations to Mustapha Enesi, as well as all other shortlisted writers!
Oreoluwa Odusote
Writer, poet, and dreamer.
