Cartoonist Ogon is launching his first graphic novel, a compilation of some of his best editorial cartoon works over the years, on Friday
In 2012, a young man walked into the basement cubicle of Second Street in Industrial Area that housed The Kampala Sun, a society weekly. He was a small man who was as shy as letter i. And his name didn't help either.
Chrisogon Atukwasize. That sounded more like a bad graphic work than a name, and was certainly a heavy burden of a name on the young man who looked handsome for all the other 'faults'.
But there was something else about the young man who could hardly express himself. He had a stack of paper that kept Emmanuel Ssejjengo pulling his ribs in stitches.
Raphael Okello, The Kampala Sun editor, was a hard man to impress unless you were really creative and here he was sold on the cue. He passed one over.
"How do you see?" he asked.
It was a cartoon of Bebe Cool with his chubby cheeks all puffed and stubs of that beard and the locks. There was Bobi Wine with a big mouth and there was Jose Chameleone looking scrawny and arrogant to a fault.
But the clincher was Kidiaba, the legendary Congolese goalkeeper, in his trademark celebration of tossing on his buttocks.
"It's good," I said.
It should have been "he's good" or more accurately, that the young man who took on the pen name 'Ogon' was much more than that.
The devout Catholic named after Saint Chrysogonus, a saint and martyr of ancient Rome venerated by the Catholic Church, was hired.
Abu Mwesigwa, now a senior presidential photographer, had delivered a gem to The Kampala Sun and Vision Group - although the latter would miss that talent bigly when they let him slip off their fingers.
Ogon became that fellow who spiced up The Kampala Sun with his illustrations, adding to the staple of rib-cracking photo captions that made the weekly society paper tick.
Looking back, it is difficult to imagine that the embarrassingly shy small man is the same Ogon of today who is capable of causing a revolution with his sketches.
That is exactly what Opposition leader Robert Kyagulanyi feels of Ogon's works 12 years after the cartoonist walked into the newsroom.
"A a quiet yet giant pillar in the struggle for democracy and freedom in Uganda," Mr Kyagulanyi, better known as Bobi Wine, said of Ogon.
His appraisal followed a meeting with Ogon, who is is lunching a graphic novel, "Ogon, Drawing Attention", on Friday, July 19.
"Ogon Drawing Attention" is a compilation of the Daily Monitor cartoonist's original works that span various themes and subjects from recent times.
Ogon has been with Daily Monitor since 2013 when he joined as an illustrator and understudy to Moses Balagadde on the editorial cartoon desk.
When Mozeh, as Balagadde signed off, died in 2016, Ogon stepped up and the realm of his ability to capture details of his subjects and bring out their near-perfect match of their identity in his works has been one of the things every avid reader of the Daily Monitor looks forward to.
That strengthen of bringing out realism, complemented by rib-cracking satirical speech bubbles, is loved and loathed in equal measure. You just have to be on the receiving end of his uncensored work to feel the wrath of a sketch and a few accompanying texts.
Dr Jimmy Spire Ssentongo, a fellow cartoonist, threw a pound for the pound from Ogon, saying while they say the devil lies in the detail, Ogon's genius lies in the detail.
"Each piece from him communicates artistic mastery and depth of though," he said in the book review. "I'm glad that this collection has come, not just as as entertainment and socio-political critique, but also as a national art heritage."
During his meeting with Ogon at the weekend, National Unity Platform principal Bobi Wine urged the cartoonist to "keep criticising us".
"Look here, Ogon, I am not infallible, and no human is,. so once in a while, we leaders will err here or there," he said. "It's your responsibility to guide us and shine light on our actions. It .doesn't matter if or not we are comfortable with the criticism. Keep doing it."
Ogon Drawing Attention is a book that has been brewed like Carlsberg beer claims it does its stuff - a very long process. But it is finally here, featuring some of the top works of the cartoonist over the years.
"Ogon Drawing Attention aptly puts it; its not just a collection of entertainment and socio-political critique, it -indeed- is a part of our national art heritage," Spire, a published author of both books and graphic novel, said.
The works are organised under different themes from politics and economy to Parliament and society, and from the look of the cover illustration, readers are getting a treat of 11 chapters of absolute wit and unlimited satire.
Where Eng Badru Kiggundu would not want to see that thing of him dusting his hands after burying democracy in 2016, Ofwono Opondo will probably ask "why always me?" for that legendary pen and underwear frame.
And Mao's bridesmaid depiction remains one of the ages!
Paying tribute to Ogon, Bobi Wine said in a country where free speech has been reduced to "In 1986..." a country where hunger and disillusionment have taken away the smiles of the people, cartoonists like him still manage to get the people smiling away daily with their humour.
"Ogon is unapologetically brittle with his pencil and he just seems to spare no one. Even if you were uncomfortable at what he depicts of you, you would still smile at the ingenuity of his work," he said.
Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters
Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox
Mr Daniel Kalinaki, Nation Media Group Uganda general manager, said Ogon packs packs an iron fist in a elvet glove.
"His art is accessible and over-the-shelf but his politics, and the stings in his arguments, are always in the detail, only accessible to those who know where to look, what to see," he said.
Ms Carol Beyanga, one of the editors who took on Ogon at the Eighth Street from the First Street, said she could not be more proud of who he has become.
Ms Beyanga, whose mentorship everyone who has passed through Namuwongo-based newsroom while she was Features Editor sings praises of, is one person Ogon said had to appear in the review of his book.
"He draws with skills, writes with flair and infuses humour into sometimes even the most mundane or deflating situations," she wrote in the review.
Like Bobi Wine puts it, the beauty of documenting such works is that while some of the past newspapers might not be readily available today, this graphic novel has a compilation of the best of them all.
"Perhaps with more 'pen soldiers' like Ogon to support the foot soldiers in the trenches, the struggle would be seeing the horizon sooner," Bobi Wine said.
Yes, perhaps, for what unites the nation as much as a cartoon does outside of soccer?
Well, for Ogon, his first big day is on this Friday... the next is when he ends that bachelor life.
