The 2026 Voix d’Afriques (Voices from Africa) literature prize has been awarded to Pascal Boroto, a young writer from the Democratic Republic of Congo, for a novel inspired by his journalist mother.
Boroto is in residence at the French Institute in Kinshasa, where he will receive his prize on Friday. He said he was surprised and moved to win the award after entering just two weeks before the deadline.
The 24-year-old, from Bukavu in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, was selected from five finalists for his first novel, Le nom de ma mère (My Mother’s Name).
This is the first time a writer from the Democratic Republic of Congo has won the prize, after previous winners from Côte d’Ivoire, Congo-Brazzaville and Cameroon.
The award was created by JC Lattès publishing house, in partnership with RFI and the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris in Paris.
The eight-member jury was led by Senegalese writer Mohamed Mbougar Sarr, winner of the 2021 Prix Goncourt.
Family influence
One of six children, Boroto trained as an economist but had always wanted to write, following in the footsteps of his mother, journalist Solange Lusiku, who founded an independent daily newspaper in the DRC.
After her death in 2018, he decided to pay tribute to her through his first novel.
"My writing is a bridge, an outstretched hand, which originates in that tension, the one that exists between life and disappearance, between absolution and denunciation, between presence and absence. At its core, it is born from the space that separates me from and connects me to my mother and to my land," he writes in the book.
Tale of conflict and memory
The novel follows a narrator who joins his mother’s newspaper before travelling to Goma, a city marked by war and suffering.
Working in camps for displaced people as part of data collection teams, Boroto also founded the association Les Voix des Oubliés (The Voices of the Forgotten) to share stories from people affected by the conflict.
"There are names that uplift, others that crush, and the one Pascal inherited from his mother is a heavy burden. Being her son demands commitment, courage. How can one be worthy of it? How can one give voice to others, to the forgotten, the displaced, when one is searching for one’s own?" JC Lattès wrote when announcing the jury’s decision.
African writers celebrated with prestigious French literary prizes
Created in 2021, the Voix d’Afriques prize is open to writers under the age of 30 who write in French and have not yet been published.
The story must take place, in full or in part, in an African country, or reflect current political, economic or social issues linked to the continent.
More than 17,000 people have registered on the platform since the prize was launched, with 144 entries for the 2025-2026 edition.
