US election no joke for cartoonist

ROSS GIBLIN/The Dominion Post

MAKING A POINT: Patrick Motu, 14, among cartoon cutouts by Tanzanian-born, Kenyan- based freelance cartoonist, who uses the name Gado, at Frank Kitts Park as part of the 10th Cartooning for Peace symposium.

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Cartoonist Godfrey Amon Mwampembwa's job is to see the funny things in life but he must have been the only man in Kenya not celebrating Barack Obama's election win.

The Tanzanian-born, Kenyan- based freelance cartoonist, who uses the name Gado, was one of 20 international cartoonists invited to Wellington to attend the 10th Cartooning for Peace symposium.

But despite having a valid New Zealand visa and return air tickets, Gado's plans to attend were thwarted by the election of the United States' first black president. Trouble began after he left his passport at a government office in Nairobi so that his Kenyan work permit could be renewed.

Gado returned to collect the passport last Thursday – only to find the office doors locked as Kenyan workers declared an impromptu national holiday to celebrate the election success and ethnicity of Mr Obama, whose father was born in Kenya.

Cartooning for Peace organiser Olivier Pellenard, of Alliance Francaise in Wellington, said Gado "called in favours and pulled strings" in an attempt to retrieve his passport and make it to the airport. But the efforts were in vain and the trip to Wellington was abandoned.

"It is so ironic that the election of the first black American president means the only representative from southern Africa can't come to the symposium."

Efforts to set up a video link from Kenya so Gado could take part in the symposium proved impossible. However, his cartoons are included in a display in the Michael Fowler Centre foyer till the end of the conference on Saturday. The cartoons would then be displayed at Alliance Francaise till the end of next month.

About 50 life-sized images, from the work of all the cartoonists involved in the conference, have been used to stage a series of peaceful protests.

The images, signed by the cartoonists, were in Frank Kitts Park yesterday. They will be in Civic Square today before being auctioned. Proceeds will go to the Cartooning for Peace Foundation, which was started by Plantu, a political cartoonist for the French daily newspaper Le Monde.