7-year-old Athandiwe Sikade winner of Nal’ibali’s story telling competition

Our warmest congratulations to Athandiwe Sikade of Khayelitsha in Cape Town who yesterday was announced as the winner of the nationwide storytelling competition Story Bosso.

Competing against 14 other finalists for the title of South Africa’s first Story Bosso, Sikade was chosen for her spirited storytelling style and skill relative to her young age. Her entry was an animated retelling of uMboleki, a humorous children’s story with a deeper message about how to behave appropriately in society.

Sikade entered the competition at her school, Chumisa Primary, where Nal’ibali hosted one of 30 Story Bosso pop-up auditions held to source stories directly from the campaign’s network of reading clubs and communities across the country.

Story Bosso opened this September, aiming to reawakening a love of storytelling and reading among South Africans of all ages. The public was invited to send in audio or video clips of themselves reading or telling their favourite stories.

“We collected more than 2 000 submissions from across the country. Stories came in from all age groups and in all languages. They ranged from those that made us laugh, to those that made us cry, but best of all, they showed us that a spirit of storytelling – oral, written and in many languages is alive and well, which we can use to inspire children to want to read and write” says Jade Jacobsohn, Managing Director of Nal’ibali.

Nal’ibali is driven by PRAESA, 2015 ALMA laureate.

More about Nal’ibali here.