Gaby Arow

It is with immeasurable sorrow that the MOBO Organisation announces the passing of its Founder and CEO, Kanya King CBE. Kanya passed away peacefully on 3 June 2026 after a courageous and characteristically determined battle with colon cancer. She was surrounded by her family, close friends and love. Thirty years ago, Kanya King remortgaged her home, alone, without institutional backing or industry support, to build a stage that would transform British music forever. She was a single mother from a Kilburn council estate who was told that Black music was too niche, that there was no market and that the industry was not interested. Instead of arguing, she built. Six weeks later, the first MOBO Awards was broadcast to the nation, and nothing was ever the same again. What Kanya created was never simply an awards ceremony. It was an act of cultural justice. MOBO did not just celebrate Black music; it legitimised it, amplified it and transformed the cultural landscape of the UK. From Stormzy, Little Simz and RAYE to Craig David, Ms. Dynamite, Amy Winehouse, Central Cee and countless others, generations of artists have benefited from Kanya King's vision. She built a platform that reached hundreds of millions of people around the world. She was awarded a CBE and received an Ivors Academy Honour in 2025. She never stopped. She never asked for permission. She never accepted that the word “no” was final. When she stood on the MOBO stage in Newcastle in February 2025, just months after her diagnosis, she told the audience: “I never allowed someone to define my limits. Not in life. Not in business. And I’m certainly not going to have that happen now.” That was Kanya King. Right to the very end. The 2026 MOBO Awards, held during the Organisation’s landmark 30th anniversary year, will be dedicated entirely to her memory. The world was a profoundly better place with Kanya King in it. The MOBO family is heartbroken, but endlessly grateful, proud and inspired by everything she gave to music, culture and future generations. Rest in power, Kanya. You built this. All of it.