Besides the fact that under a League of Nations mandate in 1919, Cameroon was divided between Britain and France, and British Cameroons was administered from the British territory of Nigeria, Cameroon and Nigeria share an embryonic cultural and literary history, evident by the number of Cameroonian writers whose publishing history stretches to Nigeria. Sankie Maimo’s I am Vindicated (Ibadan University Press, 1959), the first known book by an English speaking Cameroonian, was published in Ibadan; Bate Besong’s first book, Polyphemus Detainee and Other Skulls (Scholars Press, 1980), was launched in Calabar, and fourteen years later, he won the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) award in drama for Requiem for the Last Kaiser. In 1992, Bole Butake (for his play The Survivors) and Tanla Kishani (for his poetry collection Konglanjo) were shortlisted for awards by the ANA.
In November 2011, ten months and a day after Pala-Pala magazine—Cameroon’s foremost online literary magazine—became defunct, Bakwa magazine was founded. Though the influence of pioneering magazines such as Chimurenga in Cape Town and Kwani? in Nairobi is undeniable, Saraba’s pioneering role, and influence on Bakwa was accentuated by Nigeria’s proximity to Cameroon, making the Limbe to Lagos collaboration almost inevitable. Saraba had been founded three years prior.
Yet, despite this shared history, both countries scarcely engage in projects of shared literary benefit. The Literary Exchange project, launched in early 2017 with the support of the Goethe Institut in Lagos and Yaoundé, was a direct response to this.
At some point during the project, a pattern emerged in the kinds of questions we were asked. “Why didn’t we use this as an opportunity to explore pressing political issues such as Boko Haram or Bakassi?” Despite the legitimacy of these questions, they inadvertently hinted at how history, in relation to Cameroon and Nigeria, is invested in the inglorious. This makes the premise of the exchange programme all the more urgent, as it not only seeks to give the opportunity to young writers to explore humanity through nonfiction, but it also intends to reinforce the hitherto little known aspects of our shared history.
Our technique for the Exchange Project was to find similarities that were untethered to artificial constructs like borders on the African continent. The conversation about the geographical proximity of Nigeria and Cameroon is a trite one belied by rivalry that spans from the Bakassi Pennisula to the now-famed African Nations’ Cup final match between the two countries in 2000. Cross-cultural engagements are incredulously scanty; it is baffling that only a few hours by the waterway will take you from Calabar to Tiko.
Besides publishing theme-specific issues of our literary magazine, the Saraba Manuscript Prize was launched in 2015 as an attempt to give Nigerian writers an opportunity to develop manuscript-length work. Our decision to focus on both fiction and non-fiction was greeted with mixed response. While there was a resounding engagement with the fiction, obvious from the large amount of manuscripts we received, our slush pile lacked quality non-fiction submissions. After extending the deadline, we still received a paltry amount of non-fiction submissions. Unrelenting, we commissioned five longform nonfiction essays after a call for pitches. But our charge was still at large: most of the manuscripts were in need of serious work.
In this regard, the Limbe-Lagos Literary Exchange enabled Saraba and Bakwa to engage non-fiction writing in a practical, pan-African manner. Our intention was to nurture a new crop of writers with promise from both Cameroon and Nigeria, expose them to the possibilities of non-fiction in the most hands-on manner through travel, workshop and mentorship. At the end of our project, we hoped that the participating writers would have travelled (the Cameroonians to Nigeria and vice versa), learnt how to engage with the possibilities of writing non-fiction in a practicable and sustainable manner, and produced an original piece of writing to be anthologized.
Here is a compendium of keepsakes from writers whose foray into the landscape of the mind is a compelling signpost to formidable writing. Here are stories that are not only true because they happened but because they are windows that open into our contemporary African existence. Here are stories that obsess about the self, about relationships erotic and complex, about defunct corporations, about affection, and about the endless things that ramify into shared humanity.
Dami Ajayi, Dzekashu MacViban, and Emmanuel Iduma
July 2018
Nkiacha Atemnkeng 
Sada Malumfashi 
Raoul Djimeli