MEET THE JUPP27 JUDGING PANEL
Chief Judge
Prof. Razinat Mohammed is Professor of English, Feminist Literary Criticism and Creative Writing at the University of Abuja. She is the award-winning author of A Love Like a Woman’s and Other Stories (2006), Habiba (2013), and The Travails of a first Wife (2015), as well as numerous scholarly articles and books. She is a two-time Judge for the NLNG Nigeria Prize for literature (2015 and 2017), and was a Resident Writer in El-Gouna, Egypt May/July, 2011. She is Chair of the Department of English and Literary Studies, University of Abuja, Nigeria.
Adjudicators
Bash Amuneni Bash Amuneni is a poet, architect, and cultural curator whose work bridges continents and disciplines. He wrote Portsmouth FC’s official club poem, chronicling the club’s 126-year history and serving as the first Nigerian to be Poet-in-Residence at an English Football Club. He is the Director of Programs of the Abuja Literary Society and also serves as the Nigerian Ambassador to the World Poetry Slam Organisation. His poetry has been featured at Ake Festival, Poetry Africa, Lagos Poetry Festival, Kaduna Book & Arts Festival, HIBAF, SLAMeroun, Festival of Ideas Sussex, SpeakEasy Brussels, EU Night of Human Rights, Victorious Festival, and the D-Day 80 Commemoration in Portsmouth, amongst so many others.
Michael Imossan is a poet and editor of Ibibio origin. He won the 2024 Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poetry for his collection, All that Refuses to Die (University of Nebraska Press). He is also the author of the poetry chapbooks, The Smell of Absence (Akashic Books) and For the Love of Country and Memory (PoetryColumn-NND). A two-time recipient of the PEN International Writers Grant, Michael is currently a Martha Meier Renk fellow at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he is studying for an MFA in Creative Writing (Poetry).
Dr Kufre Friesenhan