Nigerian wins Commonwealth literary competition

Nigeria's Kachi Ozumba has been named as the winner of the Africa regional prize of the 2009 Commonwealth short story competition. His story, "The One-armed Thief", was adjudged as the best from the region in the yearly competition. Three other Nigerians were named in the "Highly Commended" category. They are Ayobami Adebayo for his story "Dreams"; Akinwumi Akinwale for "LIFO" and Mbofung Carlang for "The Father's blessings".

The overall prize was won by Jennifer Moore from the United Kindom. The Commonwealth Broadcasting Association, the organiser of the competition, describes her winning story "Table Talk" as "a witty and poignant conversation about life and death". Moore's winning story was the best story from the Canada and Europe region before winning the overall prize.

The winners were chosen from about 4000 entries sent in from all Commonwealth countries.

Since its establishment in 1996, the Commonwealth Short Story competition is open to writers from Commonwealth member-countries and continues to promote new voices in creative writing.