By Murjanatu Abdullahi

Hajiya Salame Duniya Wata Dama was born into the family of Mallam Mu’azu and Dije, in a village called Alkarya now in Charanchi Local Government Area, in 1929. She was the second daughter in a family of five children. At an early age, she was enrolled in Makarantar Allo, along her siblings. At the age of fourteen as a young girl, an elderly man in Alkarya village proposed to her for marriage. She told her parents that she was not interested in him, yet her father insisted that she must marry him.”

A few nonths after the marriage, Salame ran away to her relatives in Rawayau village and later to Dutsin-ma. At Dutsin-ma she met a woman food vendor, Dije, who promised to take care of her, provided she agreed to go to Katsina with her. Salame accepted the offer and moved to Katsina around 1944, where she assisted the woman in selling food at Sabon Layi Katsina. That was how Salame (Duniya Wata Dama) found herself in Katsina.

Salame got her initial capital through savings from her previous work and started a catering businesS at Sabon Layi ward, a well-known commercial centre in the Katsina metropolis. Sabon Layi also accommodated immigrant communities from the southern part of the country who owned boutiques and shops. Salame’s food-selling business prospered partly due to the nature of the area. She was nicknamed Duniya Wata Dama because of the stiff competition and rancour between her and Indo Ingawa. Salame usually told the other woman Duniya Wata Dama (meaning who cares about the world) hence she came to be referred to as Salamne Duniya Wata Dama.”

Salame established a restaurant hotel named Kings Garden Hotel at Sabon Lavi. Behind  Katsina Radio Station in 1973, where varieties of dishes, pepper soup and drinks were sold. Salame was the first woman in Katsina to establish a hotel, she also owned a house and fhree others for rent at Sabon Layi and Sabuwar Kasuwa. In the long run, Salame marriedaman from Rafin Dadi called Dan Kanen Kaza. The marriage lasted only for two vears and he divorced her, and she returned to her business. Thus she emploved several women to work in her Kings Garden Hotel, as caterers, waiters, plate washers and cleaners.

In most Hausa societies, it has been a tradition by prominent people and those connected with the ruling houses to pay visits to traditional rulers during festivals especially the two J idel-fitr and Eidil-Kabir. Salame used to pay such a visit to the palace of the emir. 

In 1982 she visited the emir, Muhammad Kabir Usman, and she presented two big rams as oifts to the emir. He counselled her to quit the hotel business, fear Allah, find a husband and get married. HajiyaSalame accepted the emir’s advice, she closed down the Hotel, repented and quit the hotel business. She got married to Alh Sani Jikan Mallam in 1982.

Hajiya Salames’s Husband, Sani Jikan Mallam helped in the development of her business Apart from the houses she rented out, she entered the transportation business and owned several commercial buses that conveyed passengers from Katsina to Funtua, Malumfashi, Kano, Kaduna, etc. Hajiya Salame also owned trucks that were usually hired by government contractors, individuals and construction companies to carry cement, sand, soil, stones, etc. to construction sites. She also owned several trailers for the haulage of merchant goods to Lagos, Shagamu, Lokoja, ete. The trailers conveyed cows, goats,

grains, groundnut oil, etc. to the southern part of the country. In return, they camne back with things like kola nuts, palm oil, cassava flour (Garin Kwaki), fruits, etc. The drivers reported fortnightly or monthly.

By 1989, Hajiya Salame ventured into poultry farming and rearing of livestock. She was said to have built a large poultry house at Dandagoro, thereby serving as the first female poultry farmer in the Katsina metropolis. Thus, many (wholesale and retailers) bought cggs and chickens from Hajiya Salame’s farm.

Among the philanthropic activities of the Hajiya Salame were four mosques in the Katsina metropolis, two at Sabuwar Kasuwa, one each at Yarkasuwa and behind Garama Primary School. Similarly, during Ramadan (fasting) she usually cooked food and distributed it to the needy. Hajiva Salame was childless but she raised many of her cousins’ children, after She got married. took care of their education both Western and Islamic. She sponsored Lne marriage of the girls, as for the males, she even gave them houses as a marriage gift. Ole severally sponsored her relatives for the pilgrimage to Mecca. Hajiya Salame remained Sani Jikan Mallam’s wife till her death (the marriage spanned for over thirty years) in 2013 at the age of eighty-three. Her husband Alh Sani Jikan Mallam and her sister Hajiya Binta inherited her wealth. 

This article was culled from a book titled: Katsina In Transition, Exploring The History of Royalty, Culture, Trade, and Security.

Edited by M.D. Suleiman, Samaila Suleiman, Ibrahim Sani Kankara, Waisu Iliyasu. Sponsored by Sardaunan Katsina Alhaji Ahmad Rufa’i Abubakar CON