Learn Hardcore Hausa: Musa matashi ne wanda yake son ya taimaka wa al'umma. - Musa is a young man who wants to help the community.

It comes from the root ƙuruciya / matasa (youth).
Grammatically it’s masculine, and in everyday speech it tends to refer to a young male.
The usual plural is matasa (young people / youths).

For a clearly female person, speakers are more likely to use something like budurwa (young unmarried woman) rather than matashi.

Why do we need ne after matashi in Musa matashi ne?

In Hausa, when you say “X is Y” and Y is a noun or adjective, you usually need a little copula particle: ne, ce, or ne/ne (depending on gender/number and emphasis).

Musa matashi ne. = Musa is a young man.
ne here is the masculine singular form, matching Musa / matashi.

Without ne, Musa matashi sounds like two nouns just placed together, more like “Musa, (the) youth” as a noun phrase, not a full sentence. In careful standard Hausa, you keep ne to make it clearly “is”.

Could I say Musa ne matashi instead of Musa matashi ne?

Yes, but the nuance is slightly different.

Musa matashi ne. – Neutral “Musa is a young man.”
Musa ne matashi. – More like “It is Musa who is the young man.” (focus on Musa).

So:

Subject–Predicate–ne (Musa matashi ne) = normal “X is Y”.
Subject–ne–Predicate (Musa ne matashi) = focusing or contrasting Musa with someone else.

In your sentence, Musa matashi ne wanda… is the normal, unmarked pattern.

What does wanda mean here, and why that form?

Wanda is a relative pronoun, like “who / that” in English, and it specifically matches a masculine singular noun.

Musa matashi ne wanda…
= Musa is a young man who…

Other forms you may see:

wanda – who/that (masculine singular)
wadda – who/that (feminine singular)
wadanda – who/that (plural, any gender)

You choose wanda because matashi (the person being described) is grammatically masculine singular.

What is the role of yake in wanda yake son…?

Yake is a verb form of “to be” used inside relative clauses (and some other subordinate clauses).

Rough breakdown:

ya = “he”
ke = a form of “be” used in certain constructions
Written together as yake.

In wanda yake son…, it roughly means “who is (in a state of) wanting…”:

yake son ≈ “(he) is wanting / he wants / he likes”.

Outside of a relative clause, you would more often see yana:

Yana son taimaka. – He wants/likes to help.

Inside the relative clause with wanda, yake is the common choice:

wanda yake son taimaka – who wants/likes to help.

Is yake one word or two words (ya ke)?

Grammatically it’s “ya” + “ke”, but in modern writing it is normally written together: yake.

So:

Spoken: something like [ya-ke]
Written: yake

You’ll see the same pattern with other pronouns:

nake (ni + ke) – I am (in this construction)
kake (ka + ke) – you (m.sg) are
suke (su + ke) – they are

In all of these, the -ke part is that special “be” used in relative / descriptive contexts.

Why does the sentence use son instead of the verb so?

Hausa has a verb so (to love, like, want), and it also has a verbal noun son (love, liking, desire).

In yake son, the word son is that verbal noun; literally it’s like saying:

yake son = “(he) is in a state of desire / he has desire (for)…”

It then takes a complement:

yake son ya taimaka = “he wants (that) he should help”.

Typical patterns:

yana son abinci – he wants/likes food.
yana son tafiya – he wants/likes travelling / the journey.
yana son ya taimaka – he wants to help.

You can also hear yana so ya taimaka in many dialects, but son is the noun form and is very common in this type of construction.

Why is it ya taimaka and not yake taimaka?

After an expression of wanting, intention, or wish (like yake son), Hausa normally uses a subjunctive / jussive form of the verb, not a progressive one.

ya taimaka here is subjunctive: “that he (should) help”.
If you said yake taimaka, that would mean “he is (currently) helping / he usually helps”, which does not match “wants to help” in this structure.

So:

yake son ya taimaka
≈ “(he) is wanting that he should help”
= “he wants to help”.

This ya in ya taimaka is not past tense here; in this context it’s a subjunctive marker for “he should (help)”.

Why do we need wa before al'umma in ya taimaka wa al'umma?

The verb taimaka (“to help”) in Hausa normally takes its person or group being helped with the preposition wa (or ga, depending on dialect/region).

taimaka wa mutum – help a person
taimaka wa al'umma – help the community

So wa here is like English “to” in “help to the community”, though in English we don’t say it that way. In Hausa, taimaka almost always appears as taimaka wa / taimaka ga when you mention who is being helped.

Without wa, taimaka al'umma is usually ungrammatical or at least sounds wrong to native speakers.

How do you pronounce the apostrophe in al'umma, and what does the word mean?

The apostrophe in al'umma marks a glottal stop – a little catch in the throat, like the sound in the middle of “uh-oh”.

Pronunciation idea:

al–ʔum–ma – a short break between al and umma.

Meaning:

al'umma ≈ community, people, society, nation, or in some contexts the (religious) community (it’s related to Arabic ummah).

In your sentence, taimaka wa al'umma is best understood as “help the community / help society.”

Could I replace wanda with da as in Musa matashi ne da yake son…?

Yes, that is also common and natural:

Musa matashi ne wanda yake son ya taimaka wa al'umma.
Musa matashi ne da yake son ya taimaka wa al'umma.

Both mean essentially “Musa is a young man who wants to help the community.”

Differences:

wanda is a full relative pronoun (“who/that”).
da is a very flexible linker word that can mean “and, with, that, who…”, and it also introduces relative clauses.

In everyday speech, many speakers actually use da more often than wanda/wadda for “who/that”.

Can I say yana son ya taimaka wa al'umma instead of yake son ya taimaka wa al'umma?

Yes. Both are possible, but they fit into slightly different structures:

yana son ya taimaka wa al'umma – a normal main clause:
“He wants to help the community.”
wanda yake son ya taimaka wa al'umma – relative clause style:
“who wants to help the community.”

In your full sentence, because we have wanda (who), Hausa normally prefers yake inside that relative clause:

…wanda yake son ya taimaka wa al'umma.

If you remove wanda and make it a simple sentence, yana is more usual:

Musa matashi ne. Yana son ya taimaka wa al'umma.
“Musa is a young man. He wants to help the community.”

Does wanda yake son ya taimaka wa al'umma mean “who wants to help people in general” or a specific community?

On its own, al'umma usually means “the (human) community / society / people (as a group)”, not one specific small community, unless context says so.

So:

…yake son ya taimaka wa al'umma.
most naturally = “…wants to help society / wants to help the community (people around him).”

If you wanted to make it clearly a specific community, you would normally specify it:

al'ummar garinsu – the community of his town
al'ummar musulmi – the Muslim community
al'ummar ƙasarsa – the community of his country

In the given sentence, it sounds general: he wants to help his society / his people.