Third Person Jussives | Hausa Grammar

A jussive directs, permits, or wishes an event involving someone other than the addressee: “let him come,” “have her call,” “they should wait,” or “may it happen.” Hausa does not need a separate jussive conjugation. It uses the ordinary subjunctive markers ya, ta, su, and impersonal a before the verb.

All unlabelled examples are (neutral Nigerian Standard Hausa). “Jussive” names a function of the subjunctive, not an extra TAM paradigm. The exact force—order, permission, wish, blessing, or arrangement—comes from the context and surrounding words.

The full subjunctive set

Seeing the whole system makes the third-person forms easier to place. Standard boko does not show their short low tones.

Person	Marker	Directive-style example
1st singular	in	bari in shiga — let me enter
2nd masculine singular	ka	ka shiga — enter
2nd feminine singular	ki	ki shiga — enter
3rd masculine singular	ya	ya shiga — let him enter
3rd feminine singular	ta	ta shiga — let her enter
1st plural	mu	mu shiga — let us enter
2nd plural	ku	ku shiga — enter, all of you
3rd plural	su	su shiga — let them enter
impersonal	a	a shiga — let one enter / entry should begin

The forms central to this page are:

ya for masculine singular;
ta for feminine singular;
su for plural, without a gender distinction;
a when the responsible person is unspecified.

Ya shigo yanzu; manaja yana jiransa.

Have him come in now; the manager is waiting for him.

Ta kira ni bayan ta gama aiki.

Have her call me after she finishes work.

Su zauna a zauren na ɗan lokaci.

Have them sit in the reception area for a little while.

These clauses do not assert that the actions have happened. They put the events forward as directives.

💡

English hides third-person commands behind let, have, or should. In Hausa, look first for the short subjunctive marker: ya, ta, su, a + verb.

A noun subject does not replace the marker

When the intended actor is named, the noun phrase comes before the agreeing subjunctive marker:

Yara su shiga aji yanzu.

The children should enter the classroom now.

Amina ta kawo takardun gobe da safe.

Amina should bring the documents tomorrow morning.

Musa ya rufe shagon da ƙarfe shida.

Musa should close the shop at six.

The order is noun + marker + verb: yara su shiga, Amina ta kawo, Musa ya rufe. English can say Have Amina bring the documents without a pronoun after Amina. Hausa still needs ta, because the preverbal marker carries person, number, gender where relevant, and mood.

This rule also holds inside a reported directive:

Shugaba ya ce ma’aikatan su dawo da wuri gobe.

The supervisor said the employees should return early tomorrow.

The completive ya ce reports the supervisor’s speech. Ma’aikatan su dawo is the plural jussive content. The time phrase gobe does not require za su because this clause presents an instruction, not an independent prediction.

Order, permission, arrangement, or wish

The marker does not encode social force by itself. The same grammatical shape can serve several speech acts.

Context	Example	Natural English force
order	Su bar wurin yanzu.	Have them leave now.
permission	Bari ta shiga.	Let her come in.
arrangement	Musa ya fara, Aisha ta biyo shi.	Musa should start, and Aisha should follow him.
wish	Allah ya ba ku lafiya.	May God grant you health.

Bari ta yi bayani kafin ku yanke hukunci.

Let her explain before you make a decision.

Musa ya fara gabatarwa, sai Aisha ta nuna hotunan.

Musa should begin the presentation, then Aisha should show the pictures.

Bari explicitly introduces permission or allowing. Bare jussives rely more heavily on situation and tone. A supervisor’s Su bar wurin yanzu can be an order; in another setting, it can relay an arrangement. Politeness is not built into su.

Blessings, invocations, and conventional wishes

Third-person masculine ya is especially visible after Allah in blessings and prayers. This is ordinary in everyday Hausa and religious discourse; an extended ceremonial formula may be (formal/religious).

Allah ya kiyaye hanya.

May God protect you on the journey.

Allah ya ba ta lafiya da zaman lafiya.

May God grant her health and peace.

The second example follows the special object pattern of ba “give”: the recipient is ta, not an ordinary ma-series form. The first ya is the subjunctive subject marker agreeing with Allah.

A wish need not mention Allah:

Taron ya kasance cikin kwanciyar hankali.

May the meeting proceed peacefully.

Here the predicate describes a desired state. The jussive force comes from using subjunctive ya as a wish rather than asserting a fact.

Impersonal a: let it be done

Use impersonal a when the actor is unknown, obvious, irrelevant, or deliberately left unnamed. It is frequent in instructions, announcements, meeting procedure, and administrative language (neutral/formal according to context).

A fara taron da ƙarfe goma.

The meeting should begin at ten.

A aika da takardun kafin ranar Juma’a.

The documents should be sent before Friday.

English often uses a passive here. Hausa a is an impersonal subject marker; it does not mechanically turn the verb into an English passive. The construction directs that someone carry out the event without identifying that person.

Jussive versus completive and future

Ordinary writing makes masculine ya and feminine ta look identical in several TAM paradigms. Compare the whole preverbal construction and context:

Musa ya rufe shagon jiya.

Musa closed the shop yesterday. (plain completive)

Musa ya rufe shagon yanzu.

Musa should close the shop now. (jussive in a directive context)

Musa zai rufe shagon gobe.

Musa will close the shop tomorrow. (future assertion)

Written ya rufe alone can be ambiguous without speech or context because boko omits tone and vowel length. In speech, the subjunctive marker is short and low; the plain-completive marker has a different tone-and-length profile. In writing, jiya, directive context, or explicit future zai guides the reading.

Do not call jussive ya a “past form” merely because completive ya can have the same ordinary spelling. Jussive clauses also have no separate plain-versus-relative series. For that distinct contrast, see plain and relative TAM forms.

Negative jussives

Put kada before the entire subjunctive clause. Contracted kar is common (informal/conversational). If there is an overt noun subject, it follows kada/kar and still precedes the agreeing marker.

Kada su shiga har sai mun kira su.

They should not enter until we call them.

Kada yara su yi wasa kusa da hanya.

The children should not play near the road.

Kar a buɗe akwatin tukuna.

The box should not be opened yet. (conversational)

The pattern is kada yara su…, not yara kada su… in the neutral clause structure taught here, and never kada su…ba.

Active and stative interpretation

Jussives can direct an action or project a state:

Ya ɗauki akwatin ya kai shi motar.

Have him take the box and carry it to the car.

Su san cewa ƙofar za ta rufe da ƙarfe shida.

They should know that the gate will close at six.

Ɗauki…kai forms an active sequence; san describes knowledge. Subjunctive ya/su supplies directive mood and agreement, while the lexical predicate supplies action or state. English may translate a stative jussive with should know rather than let them know.

💡

When a named third person appears, preserve both layers: Aisha identifies the actor, and ta builds the finite jussive clause. Think “Aisha—she should…,” even when natural English omits “she.”

Practice

Choose ya, ta, su, or impersonal a.

“Have Hauwa bring the key”: Hauwa ta kawo makullin.
“Have the drivers wait outside”: Direbobin su jira a waje.
“The form should be completed today”: A cika fom ɗin yau.
“May God grant him health”: Allah ya ba shi lafiya.
Negate “The children should enter”: Kada yaran su shiga.

Common Mistakes

1. Using a bare verb after a named subject

❌ Hauwa kawo bayanan gobe.

Incorrect — Hauwa does not replace the feminine subjunctive marker.

✅ Hauwa ta kawo bayanan gobe.

Hauwa should bring the information tomorrow.

2. Using future za for every English should

❌ Yara za su shiga yanzu.

A future assertion, ‘The children will enter now,’ not the intended directive.

✅ Yara su shiga yanzu.

The children should enter now.

3. Treating written ya as automatically past

❌ Allah ya kiyaye.

Incorrect if automatically translated as ‘God protected’ — in an invocation, short low subjunctive ya expresses a wish.

✅ Allah ya kiyaye ku.

May God protect you all.

4. Replacing impersonal a with a bare verb

❌ Fara taro da ƙarfe goma.

Incorrect for the intended impersonal directive — the actor-unspecified marker is missing.

✅ A fara taro da ƙarfe goma.

The meeting should begin at ten.

5. Adding final ba to a negative jussive

❌ Kada Musa ya fita ba.

Incorrect — kada subjunctive does not use the ba…ba frame.

✅ Kada Musa ya fita.

Musa should not go out.

Key Takeaways

Third-person jussives use subjunctive ya, ta, su; impersonal directives use a.
“Jussive” is a use of the subjunctive, not a separate conjugation.
Keep agreement after a noun: Musa ya…, Amina ta…, yara su….
Context distinguishes an order, permission, arrangement, wish, or blessing.
Written ya/ta can resemble completive forms, but jussive force is not past tense.
Negative jussives use kada/kar + subjunctive, with no final ba.

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