"One cartoon at a time"

Detail of screenshot from the Oslo Freedom Forum video.

A close-up of the smiling Ecuadorean President-Elect and the cartoonist who drew him: Bonil telling about his professional life constantly under the threat of the WE SEE YOU! from a presidency on the verge of the despotic, if not already fully so.

Bonil was speaking at this year's Oslo Freedom Forum and it is as always heart wrenching hearing his words. He would never but stress the humorous elements of his situation, but it is one of ceaseless harassment and censorship, never knowing what will be the next from the President.

Bonil, The Breath of Censorship, April 28, 2015.

The drawn President-Elect is terrifyingly similar to the one who is about to leave office when seen up close. Correa has a set row of teeth, but they share the small chin within a heavy lower face. There is not much to hope for and everything to work against.

Bonil speaks the softest and clearest of Spanish, but if you prefer English subtitles, they can be added with a click on the video. In case it does not, a subtitled version can be seen here:




A particularly worrying aspect of Correa's regime has been the weekly assembly, in which he would be calling upon everyone to take part in harassing critical voices. "Visiting" and "mocking" them, as he constantly puts it.

Those are utterly dangerous callings. Humans have been lynched for less through the ages and this is a strategy on a national level under the guise of off-duty entertainment.

Screenshot from the Oslo Freedom Forum video.

The strategy is all the more obvious from the fact of Correa introducing a body of armed civilians with direct inspiration from the present Venezuelan regime. A civil guard with the authority to thrash adversaries. It is sickening even writing that sentence. It purports that the population has been made into a foreign enemy in a manner, in which not even conflicting countries should be assessing one another.

For the protection of authorities, as Bonil has titled his cartoon, establishing who installed said armed thugs once and for all and in Oslo asking us all to being vigilant as to the situation in Ecuador.

As for himself he will keep drawing in spite of the harassment to his person "one cartoon at a time".

Bonil, May 2, 2017.
Note the strong delineation of each of the faces behind the decision
- for us to recognize each of them from this cartoon forward.

The cartoons shown are courtesy of Bonil and must not be reproduced without his permission.