The originator of the award, Mofiyinfoluwa Okupe, stated that it is intended to support women who are free from shame and silent cultures and who use story writing to raise the chorus of their voices for everyone to hear.
The event, which took place in Ikeja, Lagos, was aimed at women who create creative non-fiction stories. The top five story writers received cash prizes.
In her remarks, Okupe stated that writers of poetry and fiction have a lot of opportunities, but it seems that non-fiction as a genre does not have the same attention and growth.
She emphasized that the purpose of the prize is to provide Nigerian women a platform to share their own stories on their terms and in their own voices, allowing society as a whole to draw lessons from them.
"This initiative set up this award for Nigerian women writing nonfiction stories," the speaker stated, referring to the silent status of women in Nigerian society.
"We received so many essays about grief, cultural upbringing, shame in society, and childbirth.""We want to expand this initiative to the West African to be a place where Africa women are telling their story on a global and continental space," the Abebi Award says. "We want to create space where Nigerian women voices are heard literally and creating nonfiction for the world to see that we are important and have impact to change our life and everybody that comes in contact with them."
Top story writer Immaculata Abba received a prize of N150,000, first runner-up Shalom Esene received N100,000, and second runners-up Irumo Chukwemeka and Janobest Isaac received N50,000 each.