Jacana
Review: Brian Joss
This is the 25th annual compilation of Zapiro’s cartoons and in 2020 Covid-19 proved fertile ground for his pointed pen. The politicians also came in for a good drubbing over the year and some of them show just how idiotic our chosen representatives are. There is one of police minister Bheki Cele enforcing the lockdown rules: the bubbles say: “There is no dog that shall be walked”, and “There is no cigarette that shall be sold”. Missing: “There is no civilian that shall be killed* or brutalised by police”. *Eight killed in week one of lockdown – more than by the virus.
Another cartoon that struck a chord was President Cyril Ramaphosa’s assistants methodically searching his office looking for his backbone while the president reclines in his chair.
A telling cartoon is of sexual predators the movie mogul Harvey Weinstein and Bill Cosby sharing a prison cell. Although South African politicians feature prominently others that feel the point of Zapiro’s pen are Donald Trump. Everything that made news headlines in 2020 felt Zapiro’s wrath, as well as his compassion for many of the people that shuffled off this mortal coil including struggle activists Andrew Mlangeni and George Bizos as well as Joseph Shabalala, the founder of Ladysmith Black Mambazo. The pithy captions are by Mike Wills
