Emotion overcomes an elderly woman after she received a food parcel from the Nelson Mandela Foundation and others on Freedom Day.
Image: Supplied / Nelson Mandela Foundation
The Nelson Mandela Foundation on Monday highlighted that SA was not a free nation if the basic needs of all people were not taken care, especially during the coronavirus epidemic.

“On this day of Freedom Day, we can never say to people ‘happy Freedom Day’ when we know that [the less fortunate] are starving,” said Sello Hatang, CEO of the Nelson Mandela Foundation.

“We must go back to the words of Madiba in 1993. On the eve of our democracy being achieved he said that voting alone is not enough. All of us must strive to ensure that people have water, that people have bread and that they have shelter,” Hatang said.

He, along with members of the Imbumba Foundation, the Siya Kolisi Foundation and the #Each1Feed1 initiative travelled to the Musanda-Mauluma and Matsila villages in Venda where they distributed about 500 food parcels to those hardest hit by the coronavirus lockdown.

This included those who ran their own informal businesses which had since stopped operating due to the lockdown regulations, the elderly and child-headed households and owners of Early Childhood Development (ECD) facilities who haven’t been paid school fees due to children being kept at home during this time.

The foundations distributed food parcels which, according to them, could feed a family of five for a month. They also gave out hygiene products.

“The initiative intends on supporting families for a minimum of three months,” a statement issued by the Nelson Mandela Foundation read.

Joining the foundations on Monday were former soccer star Kaizer Motaung Jr and media personality Maps Maponyane, when they met the local chief and pledged their solidarity.

Siya Kolisi, the captain of the national rugby team, partnered with the Nelson Mandela Foundation in distributing food parcels on Freedom Day.
Siya Kolisi, the captain of the national rugby team, partnered with the Nelson Mandela Foundation in distributing food parcels on Freedom Day.
Image: Supplied / Nelson Mandela Foundation
Maponyane was quoted as saying: “More than anything else, the overarching freedom that every single human being must be offered is the freedom of dignity. What’s made this whole Covid crisis just so detrimental is the number of families that will be struggling, the ones that will be suffering as a result, with no source of income, with needing to stay in lockdown without being able to move, without being able to work – and therefore losing that freedom of dignity. And I think that’s what makes the work that we’re all doing for #Each1Feed1 important.”

Last week, the foundations distributed 500 food parcels in Zwide in the Eastern Cape. On Saturday, distributions were made to support child-headed households in Zandspruit, Johannesburg.

In a bid to give lasting solutions, the initiatives have also started on a project to provide boreholes to address water shortages.

rchbishop Desmond Tutu reflects on Freedom Day in the time of the coronavirus.
Image: File / Halden Krog
South Africa has not fulfilled the vision that it had when it obtained its liberation from apartheid 26 years ago, archbishop Desmond Tutu foundation said on Monday.

“The democratic South Africa that celebrates its 26th birthday today is not the fair and just country that it should be – that many in 1994 dreamed it would be,” read a statement from the Desmond and Leah Tutu Foundation.

“This cannot be blamed on the coronavirus. If anything, the virus has done the country a ghastly favour by exposing the unsustainable foundations on which it is built… that must be urgently fixed,” it continued.

Like the Nelson Mandela Foundation, the Tutu’s foundation said it is impossible to celebrate freedom when many in the country remained impoverished.

“Celebrating the spirit of Freedom Day today means powerfully accelerating the need for food, security, human rights and dignity for our all our vulnerable sisters and brothers,” it said.

They called for reflection and selflessness.

“That is the promise Freedom Day brings in the time of the coronavirus crisis, the promise of reaching beyond ourselves and rediscovering our inter-dependent soul, obligations and humanity.”

Fans and friends have mourned the death of popular actor Sipho Ngema.
Image: Twitter/ The Chat Room
Rhythm City has joined dozens of friends and fans in paying tribute to late actor Sipho Ngema, who played the role of Raymond on the show.

The actor died in a Johannesburg hospital last week after suffering from pulmonary hypertension, which caused his heart to fail.

In a statement to TshisaLIVE, Rhythm City’s creative director Eric Itumeleng Mogale said they had lost a friend and a fighter.

“We would like to send our heartfelt condolences to the Ngema family. May The Good Lord protect your beautiful hearts in these challenging times. We truly lost a friend, a fighter, and an artist.”

Eric said he had known Sipho for years and was heartbroken by news of his death.

“I worked with Sipho for many years. I knew him when he was still doing props at Scandal in 2005 before he pursued his love for acting. He played a stint role in Rhythm City as Lerato Tselapedi’s boyfriend from Rustenburg. May your soul live on Mthi wam (Sipho Ngema).”

Besides his role as Raymond, Sipho was much loved for playing Terror on Uzalo and a drug boss in the Mzansi Magic miniseries Stash in 2013. More recently he featured on e.tv’s Isipho.

Sipho’s daughter Mbali told TshisaLIVE last week that the family were devastated by his passing and struggling to make sense of it all.

She said while many knew him as a hard man on screen, he was a softie at home.

“I will definitely miss his voice and love for music. To the world he seemed hard-core and strict, but he was a genuine softie to his six children.”

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Lesego ‘Coconut Kelz’ Tlhabi spoke about some of her experiences of being a ‘suburban black’.
Image: Twitter/Coconut Kelz
Satirist Lesego “Coconut Kelz” Tlhabi has opened up about her experiences trying to prove her “blackness” to people, explaining how she was often treated differently because she comes from the suburbs.

The star has won over South Africans with her alter-ego, described as “a young white woman trapped in a black woman’s body”, and recently weighed in on a theory that “suburban blacks are more acceptable and less scary” because “the gatekeepers of our culture are white”.

She claimed “suburban blacks aren’t less black than any other locale”.

Kelz said it was irritating to have to deal with questions around a person’s “blackness”, and said living in the suburbs also made people more “acutely aware of our blackness”.

“Blackness is way more complex and layered than suburbs versus the hood. To deny some people their blackness because of where they happened to grow up is anti-black in itself. Just because you don’t know someone else’s struggle doesn’t mean you get to deny its existence,” she said.

Kelz said she had been asked to “present evidence of my blackness”, including testing her vernac and being quizzed about what she eats and which townships she has visited.

Songstress Simphiwe Dana hopes her new music doesn’t get pirated.
Image: Supplied
Songstress Simphiwe Dana fears that her new album may fall victim to piracy, urging her fans to not illegally download it.

Last week the Recording Industry of SA (Risa) reported that some of the country’s biggest songs were being pirated during the lockdown period. According to the report, piracy has skyrocketed while people are at home under lockdown.

The songstress expressed her fears on Twitter, where she pleaded with South Africans not to download or distribute her album illegally.

Simphiwe’s fifth studio album was set to be released on March 28, but due to the coronavirus outbreak was postponed till last week Friday.

“Please try and not pirate my new album. I know it’s way too easy to. And you’re suffering from your own mgowo. But please try and support artists. We bring you a lot of peace,” she told fans on Twitter.Although some tried to drag her, telling the songstress that they didn’t have enough money to buy her album, her true stans understood where Simphiwe was coming from and asked her which valid online streaming services they should use to buy her music.

Simphiwe replied saying, “There’s Joox, YouTube Music, Spotify, Deezer and a host of other ones.”

But Simphiwe has already had issues with streaming services carrying the album, after it was accidentally released on Google Music last month and then quickly removed.

While on the topic of her new album, some accused her of using her comments earlier in the week about South African men being “gold diggers” as a publicity stunt for her album.

The star was not here for it, and made it clear that she is “way too good to do publicity stunts”.Simphiwe came under fire last week for her comments, which landed her on the trends list under the hashtag #SimphiweDanaMustFall.

Speaking to TshisaLIVE, the songstress’ management said Simphiwe’s comments were “not aimed at causing harm”.

“Simphiwe is grateful for the support of her fans. She has strong views and opinions which are not aimed at causing harm. She is excited about the release of her album this Friday and would like to