Amir Muhammad

Some of my favourite conversations begin with an ordinary experience: speaking English when Hausa would have done, watching a film, helping with a community activity or laughing at my own awkwardness. Others begin with frustration about education or public leadership. I want my website to have room for all of that. A professional bi…

Ina farin ciki idan na ga Hausa tana samun wuri a fasaha da sababbin hanyoyin sadarwa. Amma kasancewar harshen a wata manhaja kaɗai ba zai tabbatar da ingancin abin da mutane suke samu da shi ba. Mu masu amfani da harshen muna da aikin da ya rage a hannunmu: samar da bayani mai kyau da za a iya dogaro da shi. Idan mutum ya bincika w…

In February 2026, I shared that I had been involved in a serious car accident about two months earlier while travelling from Kano towards Jigawa. Alhamdulillah, I had not sustained major physical injuries. I was grateful to be alive and thankful for the people who reached out and prayed for me. Some friends were hearing about it for…

I have written about many things with strong feelings: education, public leadership, community life and the difficulties facing young people. I hope I will continue learning enough to revisit some of those opinions. Changing a view after examining better evidence should not automatically be treated as weakness. The important questio…

One test of how well we organise work is what happens when we are unavailable. Does everything stop because the necessary information is in our head, our phone or a conversation nobody recorded? I do not think an organisation should depend on that kind of uncertainty. Leaving a useful handover is a form of consideration for the next…

What happens to a useful finding after the presentation ends? That question matters to me because evidence has to travel beyond the people who already understand its technical language. A community member, a journalist and a public officer may all need different explanations of the same result. We should think about those readers ea…

A grant announcement can be an exciting moment. I felt that excitement when sharing the launch of TurnUp Jigawa's Local Government Accountability and Performance project. But the announcement is only the beginning of what the organisation must deliver. That is why I think a proposal should describe work that people can actually …

I like a clear visual explanation. What I do not like is having to guess what an impressive-looking chart is actually measuring. Data storytelling should make an issue easier to understand. If colours, labels and decoration draw attention while the meaning remains unclear, we should go back to the explanation. The reader should not …

A community survey begins with someone's time and willingness to speak. That should not be treated as a small thing. People may tell us about difficulties that are private, frustrating or painful, while we are thinking about how to complete a form. I want us to remember that the quality of research includes the way we deal with …

When you ask a community for an honest review, the way you ask matters. A question can sound polite and still push someone towards the answer an organisation would prefer. I find that troubling because we may later call those responses evidence of what people think. Before counting the answers, we should look carefully at the questi…

A full room can make an organiser feel pleased, but I think we should sometimes ask who is absent before congratulating ourselves. Community engagement is not only about bringing together the people who are easiest to contact. Work, transport, language and other responsibilities can keep people away. If their circumstances are part …

When we asked people to contribute to a community survey, I wanted honest responses that could help us understand local government needs. The important word is honest. If a consultation only collects the answers we already want, we have missed its purpose. People who live with a problem should have room to explain it before an organ…

Alhamdulillah, completing the Storytelling with Gender Data Fellowship gave me reason to be grateful to the mentors and fellow participants who shared the journey. It also gave me a stronger interest in the relationship between evidence and a story. I do not want figures merely to decorate what I already believe. If the evidence rai…

After a legislative retreat in 2024, I stayed for another two weeks in Lagos. One of the places I spent time was Arena Market in Oshodi. When I later shared photographs from that visit, I wrote about the city's effect on my thinking. Lagos made me pay attention: to movement, negotiation, timing and the seriousness with which peo…