LAC announces winners of School Comic Competition 2023

Image of 1st prize winner, learner Naftal Amupolo and School Principal Mr Ifugula, Ontana Combined School, at water well

The LAC herewith announces the winners of the LAC’s Wildlife Crime Comic Competition 2023.

The winners are as follows:

• 1st place, Ontana Combined School, Ontana, Oshikoto Region, with its comic titled: “Water Smuggling. The borehole water business councillor”; by Naftal Amupolo, winning 30.000,- N$ in kind.
• 2nd place, Onguti Senior Secondary School, Onguti, Oshikoto Region, with its comic titled: “Illegal fishing”; by Edward David and Johannes Jonas, winning 15.000,-N$ in kind
• 3rd place, Delta Secondary School Windhoek, Windhoek, Khomas Region, with its comic titled “Save the Pangolins”, produced by the EcoClub of the school, winning 5000,- N$ in kind.

The Director of the LAC, Ms Toni Hancox, states that: “I want to congratulate the winning schools. I am very happy about the quality of entries received overall. We have seen a big improvement when compared to last year’s entries and it gives me great hope that our learners are indeed advancing in environmental education. We thank all schools for participating in this important project, and I hope we can continue with this competition in the years to come.”

The LAC held a second comic competition this year encouraging schools nationwide to participate in this activity raising awareness of environmental protection. (see more background details here) The LAC received overall 53 entries, from 28 different schools, representing ten regions. A wide area of topics were covered by the comics entered. The themes covered were, among others: poaching of various animal species, illegal wildlife trade, illegal fishing, illegal dumping of waste in the ocean, water pollution, illegal sand mining, deforestation, illegal fires, and littering.

The winning comics were selected based on originality, art, character, storyline, and the presence of any legal components.

The winning entries are available for the public on the LAC’s website at www.lac.org.na

We thank each school for encouraging children to participate in the competition and more importantly for instilling a desire to protect our environment for present and future generations. The competition was funded by Bread for the World (BfdW).