What is "xala"

Xala (, Wolof for "temporary sexual impotence") is a 1975 Senegalese film directed by Ousmane Sembène. It is an adaptation of Sembène's 1973 novel of the same name. The film depicts El Hadji, a businessman in Senegal, who is cursed with crippling erectile dysfunction upon the day of his marriage to his third wife. The film satirizes the corruption in African post-independence governments; El Hadji's impotence symbolizes the failure of such governments to be useful at all.

Xala is a 1973 novel by Ousmane Sembène, that was later translated and published in English in 1976 as part of the influential Heinemann African Writers Series. It is about El Hadji Abdou Kader Beye, a businessman who is struck by impotence on the night of his wedding to his third wife. It was adapted into a movie, also called Xala and directed by Sembene.