What happens to a dream deferred?
18-year-old Sibongile Mbambo experiences the answer to this theme in Mzansi Wethu's first telenovela Sibongile & The Dlaminis.
It premieres on Monday 31 July at 18h30 and it's about forbidden dreams, forbidden love and the things we must do when people have evil intentions towards us.
Enter Sibongile's stepmother Deliwe who moves in on her father and her future. Sibongile dreams of studying at university but this goes up in smoke when Deliwe marries her father and turns out to be wicked.
He becomes mysteriously ill and Sbongile needs to cover his medical bills so she gives up her ambitions of studying and takes on a job as a domestic worker at the Dlamini family's fancy pants home in Durban.
Deliwe organises the job for her and Sibongile thinks she's doing it because she wants to help,
but that's far from the truth. Deliwe has a debt and she uses Sibongile to pay it.
Sibongile starts her new job and soon discovers that she isn't alone when she falls in love with the Dlamini's youngest son Kwenzo who comes with troubles of his own.
What follows is described as a Cinderella story of forbidden romance.
The series is based on the Zambian story Zuba and the Solalas and is produced by Duma Ndlovu's Rhythm World Pictures.
Now pull your chair closer and get to know the lead characters with this Who's Who based on the casting briefs for the show:
Sibongile "Bongi" Mbambo
Played by Luyanda Zwane
Sibongile is Vuma’s daughter and Deliwe’s stepdaughter. She shares a mutual attraction with Kwenzo, an heir of the wealthy Dlamini family where Sibongile works as a domestic worker.
She is a humble, respectful and intelligent rural young woman from Ixopo in KZN. She was raised by her father after her mother died when she was only 2-years-old.
The money her father makes from his goods delivery job was enough for her and her father, until Vuma married Deliwe, who came with two more children. Suddenly Sibongile was introduced to a life of not enough.
Although she is self-unaware, Sibongile is so beautiful she could easily grace the cover of a beauty magazine, with a little makeover of course.
Humble as she is, you don’t want to be on Sibongile’s bad side. She can be quite savage and instinctively bite back when pushed into a corner.
An A-student, Sibongile has a dream of studying Interior Design at DUT and wants to buy her father a new van, unveil a tombstone for her mother, and get an apartment for herself, among other things. But fate has another plan in store for her.
Kwenzokuhle "Kwenzo" Dlamini
Played by Vuyo Biyela
Kwenzo is the second born son in the wealthy Dlamini home. He has an older brother, Vusi and a younger sister, Wenzeni.
He is in a long-term relationship with Nomalanga, the daughter of a politically influential figure, Sokhabase. However, he is romantically attracted to Sibongile, who is a domestic worker in his home.
Despite coming from a filthy rich family, Kwenzo is modest in appearance and attitude. He does not wear ostentatiously expensive clothes or drive a loud and bright sports car.
One thing that shows his taste for the finer things is his penthouse, but he is more obsessed with beauty and design than price.
Kwenzo is the more artistic and down to earth of the Dlamini brothers, and he loves working with his hands and interacting with the workers on the ground.
Kwenzo has a flair for design and designs most of the furniture in Sibalukhulu Design. Unlike his girlfriend, who is showy and all about social media content, Kwenzo doesn’t like drawing attention to himself.
At times this is his undoing, especially when dealing with his competitive brother.
Despite his modesty, Kwenzo exudes charisma without even trying. This is one of the reasons he likes moving around unnoticed.
Vumabakushoyo "Vuma" Mbambo
Played by Bhekani Shabalala
Vuma is Sibongile’s doting dad and Deliwe’s husband. Although he is not the biological father of Deliwe’s two teens, he is a good father to them.
He's a hardworking rural man, loved by the community for the services he provides, delivering groceries from town and transporting congregants to church in his beat-up old van.
He is gullible and this makes him blind to his wife’s duplicity. He has a giving spirit and sees the good in everyone, a quality that Deliwe takes advantage of.
One thing that Vuma can’t hide is his pure love for his daughter, Sibongile. Although he is not a bad father to his stepchildren, Vuma will move mountains for Sibongile.
Even though he didn’t get far with school, Vuma values education and will give his last cent to see Sibongile go to university.
Vuma is protective of those he loves (sometimes overprotective), especially Sibongile. The only time he ever clashes with Deliwe is when it concerns her ill-treatment of Sibongile.
Deliwe Mbambo
Played by Slindile Nodangala
Deliwe is Sibongile’s stepmom who has two teenage children from two different men in her past. She is Phetheni Dlamini’s old friend.
Deliwe is a hustler with ambitions to get rich or die trying, since unlike her friend, she couldn’t land a rich man.
She loves money and will do everything in her power to get her hands on it. She is a gambling addict, who believes that one day she will hit the big time and regain all the money she lost and live the rich life she deserves.
She looks and feels like a fish out of water in Ixopo. She sees herself as a city girl in a rural area. Because of this, she has never really settled into Ixopo.
Being friends with the matriarch of the wealthy Dlamini family is a constant reminder to Deliwe of the life she believes she deserves.
She works as an agent, connecting rural girls with rich families in Durban for domestic worker jobs - for a cut of course. But her love of money led her to hooking these girls up with other “jobs.”
One thing that Deliwe is able to do is be an angel in the eyes of her husband while she ill-treats her stepdaughter. She is good at being two-faced and pulling the wool over people’s eyes.
Velephi Mbambo
Played by Zamantu Khoza
Velephi is Sibongile’s troublesome stepsister and Deliwe’s daughter. She has a one-year-old son, and she is seeing two men at the same time.
She is her mother’s daughter. Calculating, manipulative and street smart. She's a teen mom, dating an older guy who supports her and her baby financially. But there are suspicions that the baby might not even be his. She is still seeing her broke ex behind her current boyfriend’s back.
Velephi has a taste for the finer things in life and uses the money she makes at the timber factory and SASSA pay to fund her lifestyle - she sometimes loans her mother money.
Although she is her mother’s friend, she is oblivious to Deliwe’s underhanded dealings because she admires her mother so much.
Velephi is a bully towards her younger brother, Sangweni, and towards Sibongile, but she is quick to play victim in the presence of their parents. Her resentment for Sibongile is rooted in envy.
She resents the fact that Sibongile ticks all the boxes of a good daughter, no child, virgin, matric, and now an opportunity to go to university.
Behind her hard-headedness, Velephi is a vulnerable teenager who feels like she failed her mom by falling pregnant and squandering her shot at a better life.
Sangweni Mbambo
Played by Buhle "Tsepo" Doncabe
Sangweni is a growing teen who is still naïve, even though he understands the dynamics of a life in a rural village. He has an excellent relationship with his stepsister Sibongile and an okay relationship with Velephi.
When Sibongile is forced to work in eThekwini, he pines for her and uses the opportunity to take up more homely responsibilities such as helping his stepfather with the mealie delivery business.
Sangweni is different from most young boys because he has a huge sense of responsibility for someone of his age. Likeable, affable even, he eases into the years of his teens with ambition.
While he is struggling at school, he has great dreams of finishing school, following in the footsteps of his sister, and perhaps taking his family out of Ixopo.
Phetheni Dlamini
Played by Ayanda Borotho
Phetheni is the matriarch of the wealthy Dlamini family. She is Kwenzo, Vusi and Wenzeni’s mother and Njengaye’s wife.
She is close to one of her many domestic workers because she went to high school with her. She is a reluctant friend to Deliwe because they are bound by an old secret.
Phetheni is a dutiful wife and mother and takes both these roles to the extreme. She is obsessed with keeping the family intact and living up to the image everyone has of the Dlamini family.
She has an obsessive compulsive nature and a personality disorder, which results in moments of euphoria, followed by episodes of sadness and despair. One thing that triggers this is her husband’s philandering ways.
In spite of her personality disorder, Phetheni is a well-functioning mother who tries to give her children everything they need. But no matter what she does on the marriage front, she can’t seem to get her husband to stop philandering.
In public, Phetheni and Njegaye are the epitome of couple goals and black excellence. Phetheni always gives Njengaye the platform to shine.
But what people don’t know is that Phetheni is actually the one responsible for the success of the Dlamini empire, which is one of the reasons she can’t leave her marriage and watch Njengaye squander everything she worked hard for with slay queens.
Despite them living in totally different worlds right now, Phetheni is bound to Deliwe by a secret they’ve shared since their days as credit card scammers.
Njengaye Dlamini
Played by Siyabonga Shibe
Njengaye is the head of the Dlamini household and business empire. He is Phetheni’s husband and father to Kwenzo, Vusi and Wenzeni. He is more loved by the domestic workers in his mansion than they do his wife because he is friendlier with them.
Njengaye is a traditional man who has managed to balance his beliefs with modern life. But he is still a staunch believer in traditional hierarchy and morals.
As the head of the family, he demands respect from his wife and children and makes the final decisions, both in his household and in business.
His biggest driving force is building a lasting family legacy, which makes him put his sons under a microscope all the time.
Although he is a traditionalist and serious with his wife and children, Njengaye is friendly and easy-going with the domestic workers, at least after a few bottles of whiskey.
Alcohol brings out the carefreeness in Njengaye, and often lands him in trouble with Phetheni, especially when he acts the fool in public.
Younger, model-type women are another weakness of his - he throws money to have them satisfy his wildest fantasies. This always puts him at odds with Phetheni and his oldest son Vusi.
Njengaye is also stubborn and struggles to apologise whenever he is wrong. He would rather apologise with a gift than admit that he was wrong.
Vusumuzi "Vusi" Dlamini
Played by Nduduzo Zuma
Vusi is the first born in the Dlamini family. He is married to a business-savvy and shrewd lady who fans his ambitions and pushes him to aim higher.
Vusi is a big dreamer and has ambitions of taking over the family empire from his father, taking it to greater heights.
He is impatient and struggles to wait for his turn to take over the family business. He is competitive and sees his younger and more creatively talented brother as competition.
He is short-tempered and is quick to run his mouth, sometimes before he thinks. But, just like his father, Vusi is too stubborn to admit when he is wrong.
Although externally he exudes confidence and competitiveness, Vusi is insecure and worries that he will never good enough to run the family empire in his father’s eyes, hence his adversarial attitude towards his father.
Even though the two always butt heads, they have so much in common. And just like his father, Vusi married a strong and ambitious woman who believes more in him than he believes in himself.
Wenzeni Dlamini
Played by Nombulelo Mpungose
Wenzeni is the last-born in the Dlamini family. She gets along with no-one but her negligibly small circle of school friends. She later grows close to Sibongile.
Wenzeni is a troubled teen who feels unseen by her family, especially her mother, who is more focused on the external image of the family and putting out fires between her husband and sons.
Because she feels neglected, Wenzeni seeks attention in her periodic bouts of lashing out. She is responsible for almost all the resignations of domestic workers at the Dlamini home.
She has been diagnosed with ADHD and has a very short attention span. She gets bored quickly, and constantly needs new stimulation, which adds to her desire to get her caregivers fired.
Because of her condition, many people regard Wenzeni as a spoilt brat, but she is far from that. She loves whom she loves, and when she does, her kindness comes out.
She is social media savvy and spends a lot of time scrolling through her timeline. This often interferes with her school work, but because she is naturally smart, she still manages to do fairly well. But not as well as she would if she focused a little more.
Gcina Dlamini
Played by Sindisiwe Zondo
Gcina is Vusi’s wife. She gets along with Phetheni and tolerates Njengaye more than her husband Vusi.
Gcina is an educated and focused woman who is so ambitious and supportive of Vusi that she encourages him to fight for his place in the Dlamini empire, even when Vusi doesn’t believe he has what it takes.
She is also strategic and calculating, at times manipulating situations to aid her grand plan. Unlike Nomalanga, Kwenzo’s girlfriend, Gcina does not come from a well off or connected family.
She is well-educated with a degree in finance. She genuinely loves Vusi and agreed to date him before she even knew he was from money.
Gcina is more concerned with building a lasting legacy and securing a bright future for her children, which is why she pushes Vusi to take his father on and not wait until it is between him and Kwenzo.
Gcina is modest in her behaviour and appearance, shunning the ostentatious display of wealth.
Sokhabase "Stanley" Dludla
Played by Melusi Yeni
Stanley is an activist-turned-politician, whose main mission is securing generational wealth for his lineage.
A late bloomer into the world of tender-fixing, Stan started as a socialist activist who advocated for equality for a long time, until he fell into debt after his business crashed and left him in debt, with a teen daughter about to go to university.
He was hooked up with a job by a friend in politics, which placed him at the heart of procurement in the Department of Public Works.
This placed Stan in the right position to facilitate tenders, and such a position naturally came with temptations, which came just at the right time.
Stan is a strategic opportunist who wants to marry his daughter into a rich family to secure his generation and generations to come.
Stan has no shame declaring his love for money, and would do anything to secure the bag, even if it means jumping from one camp to another.
Nomalanga Dludla
Played by Yolanda Myeza
Nomalanga is Stanley Sokhabase’s daughter and they share a very strong bond as Stanley raised her after Nomalanga’s mother left her marital home.
She is Kwenzo’s long-term partner and they have plans of getting married.
Nomalanga is living the life many young women her age can only dream of. She is the only child of a well-connected politician and she is in a long-term relationship with the heir of a timber and furniture company.
he has a taste for the finer things in life and loves travelling and experiencing different cuisines from different countries. However, she is not a spoilt brat.
She knows the struggle and never wants to go back to those days. That’s why she makes sure that she never does anything that reminds her of the poverty days.
Growing up during the times of financial struggle, Noma would sell sweets at school just so she could have pocket money.
Things changed when her dad was hooked up with a procurement job in government. Suddenly Noma was able to afford the finest things in life and study at the best private school, which is where she met the love of her life, Kwenzo.
Nomalanga is no coward and she is always willing to physically fight for what’s hers, and that includes Kwenzo.
Nelisiwe Khumalo
Played by Zodumo Shange
Neli is a domestic worker at the Dlamini household. She is friendly with Sibongile, and has a permanent crush on Kwenzo.
Nelisiwe knows everything about everything, especially the Dlamini family. She is inquisitive and has a runny mouth.
She is always on top of the latest gossip and always ready to share. But she plays innocent and demure in the presence of the Dlamini family members.
Neli believes that she will one day marry Kwenzo and sail away into the sunset, if only he can leave his stuck up girlfriend, Nomalanga.
Nomfundo Mazibuko
Played by Xoli Zondi
Nomfundo is the head of the domestic workers at the Dlamini household.
She's been working at the Dlamini home the second longest, with the longest being Sis Mavis, played by Sbongile Mthethwa.
Nomfundo takes her job seriously and never wants to be on the wrong side of the Dlaminis, especially Phetheni.
The other domestic workers know never to utter a bad word about the Dlaminis in Nomfundo’s presence. She is what some would call a snitch, but that does not deter her from doing her job.