Following the completion of our registration as non-profit company limited by gurantee by the Corporate Affairs Commission, we are pleased to introduce our Board of Trustees. They will provide advisory support for the organization’s wide-ranging literary projects and collaborations in Nigeria and other African countries. We are grateful for their commitment and enthusiasm.
Tade Ipadeola is an award-winning Nigerian poet who writes in English and Yoruba. He is a practicing lawyer. In 2013 his poetry collection The Sahara Testaments won the prestigious Nigeria Prize for Literature instituted by the Nigeria Liquified Natural Gas (NLNG). In 2009, he won the Delphic Laurel in Poetry for his Yoruba poem “Songbird” at the Delphic Games in Jeju, South Korea.
Jumoke Verissimo was born in Lagos, Nigeria. Her first book, I am memory won the AWF/Carlos Idizia Ahmad first book Prize for Poetry 2009, Second Prize, AWF/Anthony Agbo Prize for Poetry 2009 and an Honourable Mention in the Association of Nigerian Authors (Poetry) Prize.
She has a Masters in African Studies from the University of Ibadan and a BA Literature-in-English from the Lagos State University. She is a recipient of the Chinua Achebe Centre Fellowship. The Birth of Illusion, her second book will be out in April.
Adebiyi Olusolape has been Saraba’s Poetry Editor since 2009.
Ayobami Adebayo’s novel, Stay with Me was short-listed for the Kwani? Manuscript prize and will be published by Kwani? in 2015. She holds B.A and M.A degrees in Literature in English from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife and recently earned an M.A in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia. She was a 2012 OMI Fellow at Ledig House, New York and is a 2015 Hedgebrook Fellow. She has served as Fiction Editor for Saraba Magazine since its inception.
Damilola Ajayi is an ardent poet and writer living and working in Lagos. He studied medicine and surgery at Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife where he cofounded Saraba Magazine. Recently he published his first collection of poems Clinical Blues to laudable acclaim.
Emmanuel Iduma, born and raised in Nigeria, works as a writer of fiction and art criticism, and an organizer of art projects. He is the author of the novel Farad and co-editor of Gambit: Newer African Writing. He is director of Saraba Magazine, which he co-founded, and works with Invisible Borders, a trans-African arts organization.
He was writer in residence at Danspace Project’s Platform 2015. His criticism has appeared in such journals as Guernica, Music and Literature, Contemporary &, Wasafiri, Africa is a Country, ESOPUS, as well as a wide range of exhibition catalogues. His work with Invisible Borders will be exhibited at the 56th Venice Biennale. A lawyer by training, he holds an MFA in Art Criticism and Writing from the School of Visual Arts, New York.
