"TRASHED" is the only word that came to my mind once I had read the article that “Dr TJ” wrote about Uyanda Mbuli.
Apparently Dr Truth in Journalism (TJ), as he calls himself, is an entertainment journalist based in LA and the shocking article he wrote, titled “Blondie In the Red Dress or The Crazy BIRD was published on www.geocities.com/stopbadjournalism.
The abstract written by the also “nameless” editor of Stopbadjournalism, says that the series of articles written by Dr TJ “about” Uyanda, were aimed at criticizing the “South African press for being so enamoured (I had to look this word up, apparently it means smitten) and starry eyed by former Mrs Globe SA 2005, Uyanda Mbuli, that they were easily misled to print flamboyant chronicles of her recent trip to America without even bothering to check the facts”.
What I found surprising however, was the fact that only about 3-4 pages out of the whole 23 pages of “THE UYANDA MBULI STORY” were about the SA press. Instead the articles explain in a whole lot of detail, how Uyanda Mbuli fools us as South Africans, allegedly through her website www.uyandambuli.com.
You guys know that I am very protective of Mzansi stars so my initial reaction when I saw the article was “defend mzansi star”, kinda like I did with Zola & Kabelo but then I started to ask myself “What has Uyanda done to earn being called a star?” and I couldn’t think of anything.
She was Miss Mpumalanga, Miss Cape Town, Mrs Globe 2005 (I had never heard of this contest before), I spotted her as an extra on Tshisa and she is also the former SABC 1 Publicity Manager, who is famous for firing the Yamampela Presenters nge SMS.
(I think Robert Marawa wrote Kabelo’s “Yekela uku SMS iCherrie yam” as an ode to Uyanda for firing Gareth so shamelessly! Did you Rob?)
But whatever Uyanda did I still did not see her as a star (in my eyes) so I decided “Ok ke, defend her because she is an African woman trying to make a name for herself, however she does it”.
That was before I dealt with her rep. Heyi! Heh!!!!
Now PR people are supposed to make us like whoever they are repping but not in the case of Uyanda....more on that later.
Let me first tell you about this "can't get, can't tholakala" anonymous Dr TJ and his article...
As I read through the article, defending her seemed like the hardest thing to do, especially given how illustrative Dr TJ was about how she misrepresented South Africa in the US.
Yes, stories of her being listed as Miss South Africa on Wire Image, did make the rounds in Mzansiwood and pictures of her posing with stars such as 50, Diddy, Nicole Richie & Kelis made her the envy of a lot of people, me included. Y'all know I'm a hobnobber deluxe :)
This is the most genuine looking smile from all the celebs pictured
The article she wrote for Drum magazine after the 2006 MTV VMA’s is the one that really caught my attention. When I saw it, the first thing that came to mind was wonder on how she got invited to the event. South Africans do not know her! How did she do it? It turns out the mastermind is the US based PR agency, Diana Des Bois (DDBPR), which Dr TJ described as an agency famous for transforming any person, place or thing into celebrity status.
If you read the Sunday Times at all, you might have seen Lesley Mofokeng’s article on this issue.
Now the allegations mentioned in the article are hectic dude. So hectic that we thought it would only be fair to give Uyanda a chance to respond to them so that my article could highlight her side of the story as well...BAD MOVE!!
If you have time to read 23 pages of text, do go and check out the full article on the link I provided about but here are some of the trashing remarks Dr TJ made about Uyanda:
• She stood out like a sore thumb, stifling her natural beauty and flawless skin with a distracting and style less blonde wig. The red dress was too tight in the wrong places; too lose in the right places. It made her a beacon for negative stares of “girl, where is your stylist”.
• So star struck she was with famous that it was more important for her to hijack sub-second photo ops with celebrity icons rather than promote the virtues of her great homeland.
• Her glowing blond mane fluttered in the breeze as she dashed like a horse race across the floor in chase of yet another celebrity photo op. This impostor was a Paris Hilton wannabe.
Kanye is thinking: "Who is this woman?"
• Rumour has it that those celebrities who met Uyanda thought she was much older than her stated age of 27. If she is 27 and looks like 35, it could be that the plastic surgery on her nose was probably accompanied by some bleaching which often removes layers of young skin, only to be replaced by a harder dermis as the body tries to protect itself against the harsh bath of erosive chemicals. The price of being white is quite high.
• It seems quite clear from that website (www.uyandambuli.com/redcarpet) that this pseudo-socialite, who is like the young Leona Hemsley of SA, bullied her way into the headlines by hypnotising these star struck SA journalists into printing favourable figments of her celebrity imagination. They did not even check the facts. Those press stories (e.g. Sunday Times, City Press, Drum Magazine) on Uyanda made readers believe that our Blondie in the Red Dress was hanging out with her friend Nicole Richie, talked girl-talk with Lil Kim, shared a close sisterly bond with Beyonce (who said just call me “B”?) and spent leisure time with Ludacris. Who cares? If I was not there or did not understand how sub-second celebrity photo ops work, I too might have been impressed but they were mostly lies and stretch the truth like hot chewing gum in the sticky hands of a kindergarten kid.
• Her website is now the tool she is using to show the rest of South Africa how much better she is than them. She is showing off photos with famous USA celebrities as if they know her personally, when in fact such celebrity photos are merely what you get when you are in the right place and time, organized by great PR.
• I soon found out that a lot of people who met Uyanda in the NYC, including management of these celebrities, do not like what they are reading in the SA press and Uyanda’s close encounter with their A-listed clients.
Ok, just a reminder, it wasn’t me, neh!! Dr TJ is the culprit...not me, Dr TJ.
If only Uyanda’s reps would believe me. When I sent the article link to them asking for their comment, what I got back instead were threats, attitude, insults, threats and a whole lotta bullying. Did I mention I was threatened too?
The first response I got from Stacey at Agenda Communications (Her local PR agency) was so defensive and so filled with accusations/threats that it sent shock waves through my entire body!!!!
I read it and thought to myself “Dang Gal! WTF have you gotten yourself into?”
I was shocked, I mean, all I did was to send them an email asking for their comment before I could write my article but what I got for my trouble was something that included the following:
• “This issue has become a legal matter. Uyanda's legal counsil is dealing with it”
• “Do you know how many pages Uyanda has on her website? Have you studied all the pages on her website? Well Dr. TJ or whoever he is; 'which you might also be him' - has studied the website and wrote the 28 pages based on public information that is available on Uyanda's website. So when the investigators come up with a report - Anyone could be this faceless guy including you.”
• “What I find interesting the most is the issue of payment - Firstly there is a contract that was signed and all interactions are governed by that contract. Unless Dr. TJ or whoever his name is has given you the contract and you understand the terms of the contract including the payments that have been made anything written is fabricated and therefore it will be dealt with legally”.
Really Stacey, you woulda made such a super defence lawyer!
Anyway, after all the threats and “making sure I realize” that Uyanda’s “Legal Counsel” is none other than Madiba’s lawyer, Bally Chuene (yes, Augustine Masilela’s hubby), I was asked to send my questions through to them so that they could prepare a formal response.
Being the good girl that I am (aren’t I just!), I did just that (after I got over my shock, that is) and later got an email asking me to clarify my questions *sigh*.
Now if you read anything I’ve ever written you will know that I use my kasi primary school English on whatever I write so why they needed me to clarify anything is beyond me so I finally realized this was going nowhere and told Stacey to take a chill pill and just send the “formal response” to whatever questions she understood. I then got another email telling me that "Bally Chuene" would forward me the formal response the next day.
Now, I didn’t know that Uyanda Mbuli and Bally Chuene were the same person! The next day I got an email from Uyanda Mbuli with her “formal response” that took 2 days to prepare. This is the Uyanda Mbuli response: Drum Roll………..
"While I hold the view the that entertaining 'Hatemail' about me and my brand is a waste of my valuable time; I would like to inform you that the issue of Dr. TJ and his associates has become a legal matter which is currently under investigation. I therefore, wouldn't want to compromise that investigation by commenting on this issue."
Ok, besides the fact that this had nothing to do with the questions I was asked to email and clarify, what the hell has her “real” age, which I also asked for, got do with an investigation?
The reason I asked for her age in the first place was because the article stated that “Based on her body type and facial skin tone, make up peeps & Fashion Ave stylists thought she was pushing 33 – 35”.
Also, as a friend kindly pointed out to me, how would it be possible for them to take legal action against someone they don’t know? Nobody knows who this Dr TJ is and he/she did not respond to my mails either so how are they conducting this investigation exactly? Any legal experts in Blogiwood to assist me crack this code?
Why do we still have missing persons in SA if we have such expertise in the country? Heh?
Back up FBI, Uyanda's investigators are in the house!
Since the “formal” response does not say much, we will ignore it and check out what informal & dodgy answers came out of the emails that were flying between me and Agenda.
Take a seat, ladies and gentleman because Brown Shuga, without a PR qualification, is about to present:
THE LAYMAN'S LESSONS & TIPS FOR PR AGENCIES!!
CASE STUDY 1
• A simple question which I could not get an answer for was whether DDBPR were still representing Uyanda, after the claim by Dr TJ that they did not want to be associated with her anymore, due to the stunts she allegedly pulled in the US. So I guess this is also another crucial part of the investigation into Dr TJ’s true identity, which I might also be him. Remember that.
Lesson:
If you ask someone to send you a question, respond! If you can’t, the least you can do is to explain why you can’t. Let the explanation make some sense. Please.
CASE STUDY 2
• I dared to ask why she needed a US based agency and was told in no uncertain terms that what she does with her money is none of my business. Ok, it stung a little but it’s true. Like they said, she aint’ using no public funds to do it and she definitely ain’t no Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and I really had no business going there.
Lesson :
Yeah, that too. Do not be shy to be firm.
CASE STUDY 3
• My question about whether or not it was true that Uyanda lied to her US based agency about a death in the family & her returning to SA just coz she wanted to carry on with deals behind the agency’s back, was not answered and we know the reason right? They don’t wanna compromise the investigation… *rolls eyes*
Lesson:
Always remember the Lesson learnt in Case Study 1.
CASE STUDY 4
• Now, in the article, Dr TJ kinda insinuated that Uyanda paid Drum magazine for the MTV Awards piece so I asked them to clarify who paid whom but the answer I got said something about Drum having bought the pictures from GettyImages and thereafter the lady babbled something about how Getty pictures are bought and her favourite pastime, attached more links for me to follow…nothing about who paid whom for the article to be in the magazine. I'm still wondering.
Lesson:
Answer the question. Don’t try to outsmart whoever is enquiring about your client because you might be the one who ends up looking stupid.
CASE STUDY
• When I asked if Uyanda knew/suspected anyone who would go to the lengths Dr TJ went to, just to discredit her, I was told that “If Uyanda knew who these people were; she wouldn't waist money on an investigation process, she would just sue those people”
Lesson:
Remember to do a spell check before pressing the send button!
CASE STUDY:
• What made me give up on this matter is the following - I sent this exact question to them.
"(What’s your) Comment on allegation that she bypassed a TV network commissioned to promote SA in favor of doing that for herself?"
And this is what I got as an informal response:
"This Yanda TV network does not exist; in the same way the Nelson Mandela TV & Thabo Mbeki TV doesn't exist. Did you contact The Presidency or The Nelson Mandela Foundation to find out about the legitimacy of these TV networks? Fortunately, Bally Chuene is the Legal Counsel for the Nelson Mandela Foundation & Mandela Family who own the rights to the name Nelson Mandela. Clearly he would keep records of this, as the person that oversees international copyright of the name."
Ok, does anyone know what old man Madiba has to do with this?? Anyone??
Lesson:
Do not use Madiba’s name in vain. Use name dropping where it will actually mean something. Ever heard of the word relevance?
Ja noh, this whole issue, including the article itself did not go the way I thought it would when I first got the article from an anonymous person from "Stop Bad Journalism".
Since he ain’t replying to any of my emails (probably hiding from Uyanda’s investigators. Damn, I would too!), I would like to send a shoutout to Dr. TJ and tell him to get a life and not sit around trying to find something negative to write about South Africans trying to make something out of themselves.
If he is an entertainment journalist in LA like he says, why the hell does he give a f**k about Uyanda? LA is like the capital of scandals!
Why would Dr TJ go to such lengths just to trash someone he does not know from a bar of soap?
There are so many Black Americans with hair blonder than Uyanda’s and has he written 23 pages worth of trashing articles about them?
What is he saying? That it's okay for a Black American woman to wear fake blonde hair but it's not ok for a Black South African woman to do the same?
If you have issues with Black women and their fake hair, whatever the colour, then please go hang yourself!
Personally, I think Dr TJ is a woman and maybe Uyanda umshaye ngestena (stole her man) at some point in their lives.
TO AGENDA:
Darlings, relax! Not everyone hates Uyanda like this Dr TJ. I actually admire the woman for being so determined to make a name for herself, no matter the cost. She got up close and personal with Tyson Beckford for pete’s sake, damn, I would give an arm and a leg just to be in the same building as that man! (Hate this picture though)
All I’m trying to say is don’t be too quick to “defend” not everyone is out to get your client.
TO UYANDA:
Gal, (or is it mama, eish don't know your age) you just keep on doing your thing and we might just call you the star that you so desperately want to be. Your positive attitude rocks though, regardless of what we say about you.
------------------
P.S: Doesn't anyone else suspect that Dr TJ is actually someone from Agenda? Could this whole "Blondie in A Red Dress" article have been planted as a publicity stunt? Oh wait; can I be sued for “thinking” this?
*panicking*
Eish, I don’t have a lawyer. Anyone got a Legal Wize application form? Please send it to brownshuga@tvsa.co.za. I hope there is no waiting period!
*All pics obtained from www.uyandambuli.com