SEMA AFRICA MAN OF THE YEAR 2016 - Boniface Mwangi

Boniface Mwangi is an award-winning Kenyan photojournalist and human rights activist. He was a staff photographer with The Standard, a leading Kenyan newspaper, for four years.

He became the eye of Kenyans during the 2007/8 post- election violence and showed courage and compassion to capture thousands of images; some so gory they could not be published.

His work has appeared in leading newspapers in the world — from The New York Times to The Guardian and Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, The International Herald Tribune, The Sunday Times, The Telegraph and The Boston Globe among others.

“PAWA254 is awesome. If you want to invent, you can never invent alone. Before PAWA, there was no place in Nairobi for people like me — patriotic, eccentric, a bit crazy and wanting to do creative stuff. I decided to create a community where people who relate to what I do can actually hang out. “PAWA” is the English word “power” corrupted in Kenyan slang, and 254 is our country code. It stands for unity. It’s now a community made up of filmmakers, graffiti artists, writers, poets, journalists, activists and so on. PAWA254 is a place we call home, and it’s where we meet — an everyday haven where we have a place to support and encourage each other.”

He studied human rights and documentary photography at New York University, USA. He has twice won the CNN Multichoice Africa Photojournalist of the Year Award and is the youngest Prince Claus Laureate. New African Magazine named him one of the 100 Most Influential Africans of 2014 and he is also a senior TED Fellow. Time magazine recognized him as a Next Generation Leader in 2015.

Boniface runs PAWA254, a hub for creatives in Kenya where journalists, artists and activists find innovative ways of achieving social change

When his mother died in 2000, Mwangi, then 17, decided he had to change if he was to survive. He joined a Bible school with the intention of becoming a pastor, and secured a diploma in Bible Studies. Whilst at school he became interested in photography. He was influenced by the Kenyan photographer Mohamed Amin.

Despite not having a high school education, Mwangi managed to gain a place at a private journalism school. To fund his studies he had to continue selling books on the street, but soon began to gain experience as a photojournalist. He published photographs in the national newspaper The Standard, and in 2005 won his first photography prizes. Within three years he received international recognition as one of Africa’s most promising photographers. He was awarded the 2008 and 2010 CNN Africa Photojournalist of the Year Award.

However, he put his photography career on hold, to work on Kenyan social justice.

Mwangi quit journalism after witnessing and documenting post-election violence in Kenya in 2007 as a newspaper photographer. He experienced posttraumatic stress and depression (and he was also directly affected having to move temporarily after people of his community were being threatened). More importantly, he was frustrated he had to cover the same politicians that had incited the violence, but remained unpunished.

His first initiative was the project Picha Mtaani, Swahili for street exhibition, showing photographs of the violence in 2007 after the national elections, between the different tribes. This travelling street exhibition was shown around the country for people to discuss reconciliation and promote national healing. Over 600.000 people saw the exhibition. This was later complimented by the documentary Heal the Nation, which was shown mostly in slum areas.

Following these initiatives Mwangi started to develop a stronger human rights stance in his work on fighting (political and corporate) impunity, speaking out against bad and corrupt political leadership and promoting a message of peace for the elections planned for 2013 with initiatives called MaVulture and Team Courage. Team Courage is a Nairobi-based lobby that strives to enable a patriotic citizens’ movement to take bold and effective actions in building a new Kenya.

His latest initiative is Pawa 254, a hub and space for artists and activists to work together towards social change and advancing human rights in Kenyan society.

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