“Satire is dead. Long live satire,” Tanzanian political cartoonist Gado declares, laughing, as we sit down to discuss the role of satire, humor and cartoons in modern public discourse. Godfrey Mwampembwa - pen name “Gado” - is a prolific and prominent political cartoonist with a career that has spanned three decades.
Gado’s talent for drawing, coupled with a voracious interest in the news, led him to cartooning at an early age. Studying architecture at the university in Dar-es-Salam did not quite hold his attention, and he landed a job at The Daily Nation, Kenya’s leading daily and one of the largest newspapers in Africa. He took off for Nairobi, young and alone but eager to learn. He felt he was lucky to find mentors and an environment that was open to his ideas and creativity.
Over his many years working for The Daily Nation, Gado boasts of having offended every possible powerful person in Kenya, as well as in the broader African continent.
“I have no regrets,” he says, despite having endured threats, silencing attempts and high-pressure backdoor negotiations which found presidents, ministers and businessmen demanding accommodations.
“I am one of those people who has a knack for disrespecting authority,” he jokes. But Gado has a steadfast commitment to his work, and believes that provocations via satire “enrich the debate and bring to the table ideas and things that we are afraid to discuss.
”But when it comes to poking fun, how far is too far? I ask.
“I remain true to the principles of satire,” Gado replies.“One of the things about good satire is it doesn’t punch downward. You always punch upward. And so, in a situation like Gaza, you won’t do a cartoon to laugh at Palestinians. It would be ridiculous. But that does not mean you shouldn’t do drawings on what is happening in Gaza, because satire remains a medium that should delight, it should poke fun, it should educate, and it should also punch upward in the sense that satire should always afflict the powerful and not the minorities and the marginalized.”
The rapidly evolving global media landscape has brought about a shift in how media is consumed. The decrease in print runs of newspapers has meant that fewer and fewer editorial cartoonists are being hired, while the advent of streaming services and video-based social media has also meant a decline in viewership of satirical late night talk shows. Gado believes that “satire is in turmoil in many countries” due to a political climate dominated by right-wing movements, censorship and cancel culture. But he remains hopeful:
“I might not have answers in terms of ‘the how’ and what are we going to have in the next 10 years, but I’m very confident that it will survive. Satire still remains a very powerful tool to speak truth to power.”
Hosted by Bhakti Shringarpure.
Edited by Agatha Jamari
Radical Futures is produced by Warscapes
Title Music: “Cottonstorm” by Bayern Boom Beat
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