Shehu Sani: The writer and literary philanthropist
By Denja Abdullahi
WHAT come across to most people about the man Senator Shehu Sani is that of someone, a kind of gadfly, that has, from early in the days of his youth, been involved in pro-democracy and human rights activism. He seems to have been born in the trenches of activism and has never left there in his advocacy mission. He stands out among a very few from his natal origin up the Niger, for his commitment in building a pan-African and pan-Nigerian alliance against injustice, oppression and retrogression of any kind. That iconoclasm in his socio-political temperament has led him into so many brushes with the establishments that spiralled into hounding and imprisonment over phantom charges. He is also one of the few, out of the large clan of Nigerian activists, that fought for the return of democracy in 1999, and who did not abandon the political space to military collaborators and apologists who later took the democratic laurels for a war they never fought. He was elected into the Nigerian parliament as a senator, served a term and later got caught up against the malevolent and godfather-driven Nigerian politics. Though he is not in any political or elective position at the moment, he has remained constant in his criticism against political chicanery, social and economic injustices.
There is a quieter side of him which this piece is all about and that is the literary dimension to his personality. Not many people know him to be a prolific writer, but he has been someone whose human rights activism, pan-Africanist vision, love for his country, progressive ideals, struggles against social injustice and religious extremism have largely fed his non-fiction and creative writings.
His non-fiction published books include Killing Fields (2007), Poverty in Northern Nigeria (2007), Political Assassination in Nigeria (2007), Scorpions Under Pillow (2007), Civilian Dictators of Africa (2008), Always Wrong: Can Yar’Adua Get It Right (2009), Betrayal and Society (2009), The Children of Kaduna (2011), The Children of Jos (2011), Protest and Freedom (2012), Rebellious Ideas (2013), Nigeria and Ethiopia: An Analysis of Historical Ties (2013), The Emperor and the War: Haile Selassie and the Nigerian Civil War (2013) and Hatred for Black People (2013).
Sen. Shehu Sani
Sen. Sani’s fictional texts, which cut across the genres of poetry and drama, like his non-fiction writings, display a commitment to engaging reality from a radical disposition, often leading to the ruffling of societal conscience. There are poetic volumes such as Prison Anthology (2007), The Poems of Peace in the Season of Bloodshed (2007) and plays such as The Phantom Crescent (2009), Thugs at the Helm (2009), The Prisoner’s Life (2007) and The Defiant Emir (2012).
Another side of Sen. Sani that is unknown to most people, beyond his being renowned for human rights and social justice activism, is his longstanding support for the promotion of literature and writers across the country. He has been a quiet donor to individual writers and writers’ bodies across the country. He has been a supporter of the activities of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) at the branch and national levels for decades. He partly hosted the Association of Nigerian Authors’ 35th Anniversary Convention which held in Abuja in 2016. Before then, he was a regular donor and attendee of previous ANA conventions. At the foundation laying ceremony of the association’s Mamman Vatsa Writers’ Village in 2017, he was among the only two individuals who donated sums of money that was used in the construction of the first building on the land, which was the take-off red-brick national secretariat of the association. His recent support for the association included the sponsorship of the Mbari Open Arts Exhibition in Honour of Lindsay Barret which held in October to November 2025 at the Mamman Vatsa Writers’ Village, Mpape, Abuja and the facilitation of the recently constructed beautiful patios adjoining the frontage of The Chinua Achebe International Conference Centre of the Writers’ Village. Beyond his private and often quiet support for the literary arts in Nigeria , as a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, representing Kaduna Central Senatorial District between 2015 – 2019 at the National Assembly, he sponsored “A Bill for an Act to establish the National Endowment for Arts and Literature.” The fact that the bill never got through the parliament nor enacted into law speaks of how such supportive intellectual and artistic initiatives hardly get pass the establishment in our clime.
With the forthcoming presentation of two new books and the staging of a new play in a few days’ time in Abuja, Sen. Sani presently draws attention to his quieter side as a writer and literary activist with that unique badge of having gone to jail like other writers and written about the experience like Wole Soyinka, Ngugi Wa Thiongo, Ken Saro Wiwa, Jack Mapanje, etc. The books, a non-fiction work, The Perilous Path to Europe: The Sahara Odyssey, the drama text The Councillor and the play billed to be staged The Village and the Vigilante, will afford writers, critics and the literary intelligentsia the opportunity to begin to take another look at that intrepid comrade, politician and activist from the angles of a thinker and cultural producer. He already has a large body of work that can be critically assessed to determine his underlying literary philosophy and stand in the commune of world letters.
