Zimbabwean writer Simbarashe Kundizeza keeps his Caine Prize. The award's organisers said an internal review found no evidence that he used generative AI to write his winning short story, The Blue Fighter, the BBC reported. Kundizeza had denied the allegation.
Ellah Wakatama, chair of the Caine Prize's board of trustees, announced the outcome in a video posted on X. "From our detailed investigation, we feel the evidence is clear: The Blue Fighter was human written," she said. She added that the organisation had considered the allegations "carefully and fairly".
Wakatama said the review took a "human-centred approach". It included interviews with the author, the 2026 judging panel and the Shallow Tales Review, where the story was first published. Investigators also analysed metadata from the author's drafts. According to a Caine Prize statement, an independent cyber security and digital forensic investigator carried out that analysis.
The probe followed an article in the US magazine The Atlantic, headlined "Yet Another Literary Prizewinner Seems to Be AI". In it, journalist Vauhini Vara said the AI-detection software Pangram had flagged the story as entirely AI generated. The story follows a boy whose family falls on hard times. Vara later told the BBC's Front Row programme that every other past Caine Prize-winning story she had tested with Pangram "came out as 100% human".
The accusation caused an uproar on social media. Some African writers suggested such accusations are mainly aimed at non-white writers, the BBC reported.
The case follows other rows over AI at literary prizes this year. Trinidadian writer Jamir Nazir won the Commonwealth Short Story Prize despite allegations that he had used AI. Canadian-Haitian author Thélyson Orélien withdrew from France's top literary award, the Goncourt, over claims he used AI for his first novel. He denies the claims.
Kundizeza won the award earlier in October. The next day, he told the BBC how the story began. He had heard South African poet Vangile Gantsho read a poem in Ghana last year about her father's obsession with building fish tanks. He said he wove that together with fictionalised details from his own life around 2002, when Zimbabwe's economic troubles began.