TANZANET-KANDORO PRIZE
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TANZANET Kandoro-Prize 2002 is awarded to poet Ahmed Akilimali Snowhite

The TANZANET Kandoro-Prize 2002 is awarded to poet Ahmed Akilimali Snowhite of Ujiji, Kigoma Tanzania. The prize has been awarded in recognition of the poet's mastery of Kiswahili verse and, contribution to the language.

Sheikh Akilimali Snowhite was born 1926 in Ujiji, Kigoma where he has spent most of his adult life. He has produced an extensive body of work in newspapers and for the radio. His epic work ”Diwani ya Akilimali”, Snowhite continues the grand lineage of 20^th Century Kiswahili poetry narration with a brilliant interweave of panoramic spiritual information with political-economic chronicle of Tanzanian society in the 1960s and beginning of 1970s.

His uncompromising distaste for rhetoric and his almost prosaic frugality in the use of metaphors and reintroduction of epigrammatic and dramatic modes, updated Kiswahili poetry for the post-Shaaban Roberts' verse for the 21^th Century. These attributes, introduced by renowned Kiswahili poets Sheikh Amr Abeid and Saadani A. Kandoro found their true bearer in Akilimali Snowhite. And like all those bearers of a truly human truly transforming art, his poetry is deeply impure, deeply defiant and deeply seeking and absolutely clear that the verse must be truth to the human condition and beauty. His frank, and brilliantly alive, tribute to his mother in “Mama” epitomises what makes Akilimali Snowhite one of the most important poets writing today.

Kandoro-Prize Committee, on behalf of the TANZANET Community, awards 2002 Kandoro Prize to Ahmed Akilimali Snowhite.

Dr. Aziz P. Mlima
Chairperson-Kandoro Prize Committee, 2002

 Tuzo ya Kandoro mwaka 2002 ametukunikiwa mshairi Sheikh Ahmed Akilimali " Snowhite"

Jopo la TANZANET Tuzo ya Kandoro linayofuraha kutangaza tuzo ya Mwaka 2002 ametukunikiwa mshairi Sheikh Ahmed Akilimali Snowhite wa Kigoma, Tanzania. Sheikh Akilimali Snowhite ametunikiwa tuzo la Mwaka 2002 kwa kuzingatia mchango wake katika ushairi na lugha ya Kiswahili.

Sheikh Ahmed Akilimali Snowhite alizaliwa mwaka 1926 mjini Ujiji, Kigoma ambapo anaishi sasa hivi katika kitongoji cha Katenyanga. Tangu ujana wake Akilimali Snowhite ameshiriki katika malumbano ya tenzi. Umahiri wa Akilimali Snowhite unajidhirisha kutoka katika kitabu chake ”Diwani ya Akilimali,” ambapo amedurusi masuala mbalimbali, kama upeo wa uhai wa binaadamu, hisia za kutosadikika na jitahada ya kupambana na uonevu. Mchango wa Akilimali katika mapambano dhidi ya utawala wa kigeni, ambapo lugha ni miongoni mwa silaha muhimu, haukuishia katika tenzi tu bali katika kushiriki kikamilifu katika masuala ya kugombea uhuru na heshima ya Mwafrika.

Mbali ya uandishi unatoka katika utamaduni wa tenzi za Kiswahili, mpangalio wa beti za mistari minne-minne, Akilimali Snowhite alikuwa ni miongoni mwa washairi wa kwanza kupanua uwigo wa tenzi hizi kwa kuunganisha beti mbili au tatu pamoja kuwa shairi moja. Umahiri huu umejitoka katika shairi lake ”Mama” aliloaandika kwa heshima ya kumbukumbu ya mama yeke mzazi. Miongoni mwa waasisi wa tenzi hizi ni Sheikh Amr Abeid na Saadani Kandoro.

Kwa kuzingatia mchango huu, wanajopo wa Tuzo ya Kandoro kwa niaba ya TANZANET, wanamzawadia tunu ya mwaka huu Sheikh Ahmed Akilimali Snowhite.

Mzee Akilimali aliwahi kuwa mjumbe wa baraza la Kiswahili sarufi kati ya mwaka 1976 na 1979.

Dr. Aziz P. Mlima
Chairperson-Kandoro Prize Committee, 2002

Baadhi ya kazi zake

Mwanadamu Kumbuka