The 7th season of Big Brother Africa began a month ago.
Last year's season was extremely heartening, because the winners were truly deserving, and were voted for by African viewers.
One winner, in particular, Karen Igho from Nigeria won the hearts of Africa because of her kind heart and generous nature.
That Africa would vote for someone so deserving was an indication of the every day African citizen's morals.
With the start of this latest season it was hard to imagine that someone could top the beautiful spirit of Karen.
Then most of us fell in love with contestant Zainab Sheriff from Sierra Leone.
Like Karen, she comes across as a rough chick with lots of tattoos, a foul mouth and an over the top attitude. But under this is a very soft and gentle nature.
In general, Zainab is the epitome of Africa, a beautiful and strong person who has overcome much. She has survived civil war, rape, teen pregnancy, and many other things that no person should have to go through.
Now she is a successful model in Europe.
During the first month of Big Brother Africa season 7 it was clear that Zainab was the likely winner.
Then, she was physically attacked by another contestant, DKB from Ghana. He shoved her, and slapped her across the face numerous times.
For most of us, this was not a shock as Zainab and DKB had had numerous confrontations because he was generally very degrading to women in his words and behaviour. Zainab, being a principled person would call him out every time he did or said something offensive to her, other women, or just women in general.
She would also complain to 'Big Brother' during her chat sessions.
Nothing was done by the show, or even other contestants to correct DKB's behaviour.
Then he decided to attack her because of a joke she had played on another contestant, claiming that she had opened the shower door to look at his nakedness while he was showering.
But, the show is partly famous because showers are screened to viewers who pay an extra fee for this feature on the show's website. Contestants are aware of this.
It was clear that DKB's attack had nothing to do with this incident. He had had it out for her for a long time, and this culminated in him physically assaulting her. Of course, these was precluded with many instances where he had verbally assaulted her.
Reactions from some viewers was alarming. Some believed that Zainab deserved this beating.
DKB was rightfully disqualified from the show. Sadly, Zainab was also disqualified for 'provoking' the incident.
What does this teach us?
-The attitude that it is OK to hit women is still extremely prevalent.
-Zainab's disqualification from the show tells us that women deserve to be punished and beaten if they provoke it.
-Whether she provoked it or not is open to interpretation. But, if she did, we are saying that women need to be 'disciplined' for 'bad behaviour' and speaking up to a man.
-
Since the two were disqualified from the show it is unclear whether Zainab was advised of her rights, being on South African soil. South Africa has one of the most progressive constitutions in the world, and women's rights feature prominently. But, she is not just a woman. She is a human being who was assaulted and regularly degraded. Adding to the injury is that this was done for weeks in front of millions of viewers. The producers of the show should have informed Zainab of her rights, and even encouraged her to open a case of assault with the South African police.
DKB has not experienced the consequences of his actions as dictated by South African law.
At the end of the day this incident is not about Zainab, DKB, or even the show. It is merely one more, out of millions of instances, were women all over the world are victimised on a daily basis.
Zainab has been through, and overcome much worse than this. We do not believe that this is the end of her. Like all other resilient African women, Zainab will come out of this stronger and better. And perhaps this is the beginning of big things for her as most of us see the unfair treatment she received from the show's producers.
While it may appear that manipulating, gossiping and conniving wins the day in this show, Karen Igho's win last year is proof that the majority of Africa is better than that. According to the majority of the viewers responses, Africa still feels that Zainab is this season's winner, even if she has left without her cash prize.
No comments:
Post a Comment