Dissident Spotlight: Marzouka Oummou Hani
Marzouka Hani is a 17-year-old facing a prison sentence for a paragraph in her published novel, My Father or My Dignity.

Marzouka Oummou Hani wrote and published a book called My Father or My Dignity in which a young girl must choose between an arranged marriage and pursuing her dream as a writer.
In that book, Hani was critical of patriarchal practices, including criticizing a local deity in north Cameroon. Humangle reprinted the passage that put Hani on trial:
“Sidi considered himself a god. Bouba recounted the day when a woman and her daughter went to the market and fell head-to-head with him. They were new and didn’t know who he was. It was a law that anyone who came across the wizard Sidi should bow down. Surprised and angry at the indifference of these women, he dragged them to his cabin and no one knew the end of them.”
Sidi is an ancestor god and the mythological founder of a northern Cameroon village, Idool.
In 2023, Idool’s village elder, Chief Ahman, brought blasphemy charges against Hani for her unflattering portrayal of Sidi. Blasphemy can result in six weeks to six months imprisonment and a fine as high as $34,000.
Fiction is Supposed to be Challenging
Revisiting mythological figures tends to paint them in unflattering lights. Thomas Jefferson’s hypocrisy on slavery, Voltaire’s vocal dislike of Jews, and David Hume’s belief in Black peoples’ inferiority to white people are all fair game for criticism in fiction or non-fiction. They were humans of their time, and they were flawed.
Actual religious figures should be subject to this same level of scrutiny, especially when they’re held up as examples of ideal behavior. Jesus healed a slave just to return him to his master. Krishna justified mass slaughter to Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita. Mohammad’s third wife, Aisha, had her first child with him when she was nine. Clearly, divine figures require the same critical examination we perform on secular heroes.
Hani’s short novel gives voice to concerns and much-needed changes in Cameroon. Her criticisms of secular and divine authorities are part of a necessary conversation that revisits the way women and girls are treated in her country.
While the outcome of her trial isn’t yet known, it’s clear that fragile men have no business taking petty grievances like this to court.