Halima Aliyu is a writer, editor, and the founder/director of Ayamba LitCast – an online literary platform that features podcasts, book reviews, and writer interviews and provides a database for emerging artists on the continent. She graduated from Hill-Top Model School, Minna, Niger State.
She was the Assistant Coordinator of the Book Hawker Scheme, Consulting Editor at AMAB Books and Publishing Ltd, Pioneer Women Literacy Programme Officer at Yasmin El-Rufai Foundation (YELF), Legal Adviser at the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) – Niger State Chapter, and Creative Writing Mentor at the Hilltop Creative Arts Foundation.
In 2005, she was a beneficiary of the HCAF’s Teen Authorship Scheme and published her first book—a novella titled One Little Trick, One Painful Death. Her book of short stories, Fire on the Tip of Ice, was shortlisted for the ANA/Abubakar Gimba Prize for Short Stories. Halima is an Alumnus of the Farafina Creative Writing Workshop 2012 (now known as Purple Hibiscus.
Writing Workshop) and was a writer-in-residence at the Ebedi International Writers’ Residency 2015. She was awarded the Marine Platforms Award for writing at the Ake Festival the same year.
Her works have appeared in Prufrock, Dugwe, Expound, Literary Oasis, Praxis Journal of Gender and Cultural Critiques, Brittle Paper, Maple Tree Literary Supplement, and African Writer. She has read her work at prestigious fora in the country, including the French Cultural Centre Abuja, Abuja Writers’ Forum (AWF), and Yasmin El-Rufai Foundation Kaduna. Halima Aliyu has also attended several literary conferences and book festivals across Nigeria. She is the Chief Judge of the Nigeria Prize for Teen Authors (prose category, 2023).
She is passionate about giving back to society through art. This drives her to mentor young adults in creative writing, the most recent being a Mentor for the Youth Mentorship Initiative Program at YELF. Halima hosts the monthly Ayamba Meet & Greet event, where her organisation introduces the community to talented, upcoming, and established artists across numerous creative fields. In her spare time, she volunteers with orphanages.
Halima Aliyu, who is a winner of the Golden Award for Distinguished Art Administrators in Nigeria, holds a Bachelor of Law Degree (LLB) from the prestigious Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, and currently lives in Kaduna.
