Safaa Odah, Jimmy “Spire” Ssetongo Presented Kofi Annan Courage in Cartooning Award
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The Freedom Cartoonists Foundation has announced their selection for the 2026 Kofi Annan Courage in Cartooning Award. Jimmy “Spire” Ssentongo of Uganda will be presented the award in a ceremony tonight. Palestinian cartoonist Safaa Odah is unable to leave her homeland for political reasons but will receive her prize at a future date.
Safaa is a Palestinian cartoonist living in Gaza. From the Freedom Cartoonist Foundation press release:
Amid extreme violence and utter destitution, the Palestinian artist has been documenting the harrowing situation of Gaza’s population for two and a half years. The family home was destroyed in a bombing two years ago, and Safaa Odah and her family now live in the Khan Younis camp. Her simple, almost naive line stands firm against the din of bombs. Safaa Odah’s favourite themes are universal – family love, grief, hunger and poverty, peace – and offer a poignant perspective on the occupation and displacement of Gaza’s population. Her drawings express what words fail to convey and bear witness to a horror that the world tolerates.
In 2025 Safaa had an opportunity to join the French PAUSE program. The program provides emergency support for scientists and artists in exile. She was supposed to live in Angoulême for a year-long residency. However, her evacuation from Gaza was blocked by diplomatic and administrative obstacles. She is still in Gaza, living in a plastic tent with her family. She publishes her cartoons on social media. You can see her work on Instagram and Facebook (FB is updated most often with cartoons).
Speaking of Safaa, Patrick Chappatte, present of President of the Freedom Cartoonists Foundation said the prize “is a call to finally free Safaa from her prison of rubble.”
Spire, from Uganda, is an academic, columnist, portraitist, author and award-winning self-taught cartoonist. He has a PhD in Philosophy. His cartoons have been published in The Observer for the last 20 years.
From the press release:
Frequently harassed, Spire has been in the crosshairs of the authorities since the 2020 pandemic. In March 2024, he received death threats after launching an anti-corruption campaign on X – #UgandaParliamentExhibition – calling on parliament to be held accountable. This was not the first time Spire had highlighted dysfunctions in his country through social media campaigns that have earned him threats. In May 2024, he received the 2024 Human Rights Defenders Prize, awarded by the European Union.
Since January, Spire has taken temporary refuge in Belgium to escape the growing harassment ahead of the presidential election.
The Kofi Annan Courage in Cartooning Award honors artists that demonstrate “exceptional contribution to human rights and freedom of expression.”
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