Kanya King
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Kanya King MBE (born in London) is the founder of the MOBO Awards.
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[edit] Early life and career
King is the youngest girl of nine children (seven girls and two boys). Her father, Christian, was a labourer of Ghanaian descent, and her mother, Mary, was a nurse of Irish descent.
In her early days King attended South Kilburn High School in London, proceeding to study English and Drama at Goldsmiths College in South London. Her father died when she was aged just 13, and to help financially she managed various jobs from working in a bakery to running her own promotional company supplying people for market research.
King obtained a position with Carlton Television as a senior researcher where she was a founding member and part of the production team on the Chrystal Rose Show.
She began to develop the successful Music Of Black Origin (MOBO) awards show in January 1996, and ended up financing the first event by re-mortgaging her house. It was only when she obtained a television slot a few weeks before the event that she realised that it was all becoming real. The first MOBO Awards were held at the New Connaught Rooms in London. The 2008 MOBO Awards Show was broadcast live from Wembley Arena on BBC Three and repeated three days later on BBC One. The show was shown in 57 countries. The 14th international MOBO Awards Show was held in Glasgow's SECC on September 30 2009 with performances by N-Dubz, JLS and Kelly Rowland with David Guetta. A television audience of 300,000 watched the live broadcast on BBC Three.
[edit] Achievements
King is a consultant to a number of Government initiatives for disadvantaged youth including the Home Office Task Force to reduce gun violence. She is a patron of the Horniman Museum, and founder member of Net Women, an influential body of high profile women in the media.
She attended Buckingham Palace at the Queen's invitation to celebrate exceptional achievements by British women such as J. K. Rowling and Cherie Blair and in 1999 was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE). Other awards include an Honorary Fellowship of the University of London, and an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Business Administration at the London Metropolitan University (December 2006).
Whilst not a millionaire herself, King appeared alongside four multi-millionaire panel members in the ITV series Fortune - Million Pound Giveaway (2007), where members of the panel decide which 'contestants' to give away no-string grants to based on the merits of their pitch.
