I wasn’t a die-hard Kannywood fan, but some stories break through the noise and plant themselves in you. Wasila was one of them. You didn’t have to follow every film or memorize every actor’s name to feel its weight. It moved through the streets, the houses, the voices of children who sang it without knowing why it hurt so much.
That’s the power of art that speaks to what people live through. I’ve always picked up on the things around me, not to know it all, but to stay connected, to feel part of the pulse of the world. Football, Nollywood, Kannywood, the names that light up conversations. I might not live inside those worlds, but I know enough to feel their heat when it matters.
And Wasila burned.
In 2010, the film Wasila landed like a confession that the whole North couldn’t ignore. Directed by Ali Nuhu and produced by Yakubu Lere, it wasn’t just entertainment. It was a mirror. A banker named Jamilu, drowned in work, leaves his educated wife, Wasila, starved for attention. Loneliness opens the door, and her old flame Muda walks through it. When Jamilu returns for a forgotten file, he finds his marriage shattered in a single glance. Trust collapses, love bleeds out, and the audience is left with the raw ache of what neglect can do.
The song “Wasila 2010” carried that ache further. “Kin ce amana na, Wasila”, you betrayed my trust, Wasila. The words became a lament on every street, a melody that children hummed and adults felt in their chest. “Wasila” means a way in Hausa, and ironically, she became the means or a way through which everything fell apart. It was more than a film. It was a warning, a lesson, a wound that wouldn’t close.
So when I saw the headline: “Veteran Kannywood actress Wasila Isma’il dies at 46”, my chest tightened. For a second, I wondered if it was the character come to life. But the face in the photo was the same one I’d met through the screen years ago. The actress who gave life to that story, who asked for the film’s title to be changed from Jamila to Wasila, without worrying about tarnishing her real name, was gone.
She started in 1998 with Jinin Masoya, but it was Wasila in 1999 that made her a household name. From Kaduna to every home in the North, her voice and presence shaped a generation’s understanding of love, betrayal, and consequence. Fans and colleagues mourned her as a talent who left behind more than films. She left lessons, reflections, and a name that now outlives her.
Wasila Isma’il didn’t just act. She gave a nation a story that still stings, a song that still echoes, and a reminder that art can outlive the artist.
May God forgive her, console her family, and grant her paradise.
Bagudu Mohammed
bagudumohammed15197@gmail.com
