The Swedish Academy, which organizes the Nobel Prize in Literature, announced Friday that it will not award the 2018 honor due to sex abuse allegations that have raised turmoil among the academy members and cast critical light upon the prestigious annual award. "The active members of the Swedish Academy are of course fully aware that the present crisis of confidence places high demands on a long-term and robust work for change," the Academy's interim permanent secretary Anders Olsson said in the statement. "The Swedish Academy intends to decide on and announce the Nobel Prize in Literature for 2018 in parallel with the naming of the 2019 laureate," it said. On Friday, the Nobel Foundation said it had been in a “continuous dialogue” with the Swedish Academy over the past weeks, and that it supported the decision to postpone the prize because “when a situation ... arises that is so serious that a prize decision will not be perceived as credible”. The Nobel Foundation, which oversees all the Nobel prizes, acknowledged the crisis had tarnished the wider organization and welcomed the Swedish Academy's announcement. While the scandal might be unfamiliar to many readers in the US, it has roiled Swedish society, resulting in eight of the 18 members of the Nobel Academy resigning (even though their membership is technically a lifetime appointment without a provision for resignation) following a failed attempt to expel Katarina Frostenson, a member whose husband, French photographer Jean-Claude Arnault, has been accused of sexual misconduct by 18 women, including Sweden's Crown Princess Victoria, whom he's accused of touching inappropriately, according to CNN. Here are the past African winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature:

Nigerian playwright and political activist, Wole Soyinka was the first African to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1986. Swedish Academy says it needs to ‘commit time to recovering public confidence’ after string of resignations and wide-ranging scandal

Riven by infighting and resignations following allegations of sexual misconduct, financial malpractice and repeated leaks, the Swedish Academy has said no Nobel prize for literature will be awarded this year.
The Nobel Prize in Literature 2018 is postponed to 2019 after Jean-Claude Arnault, husband of the former Swedish Academy member Katarina Frostenson, is accused of sexual assault, resulting in her resignation, and leaving the academy without a quorum.