Opinion: The blame game in the Katlego Maboe saga

This week, TV personality Katlego Maboe’s private matters became very public when a video surfaced of him confessing (under duress) to cheating on his partner and the mother of his child.

In the video she claims he gave her an STD, which he says is “unproven”, in an interview with IOL.

Since the video emerged, Expresso production company Cardova Productions, where he is a presenter, said he would not appear on the show until the legal investigation was complete.

His cash cow, OUTsurance, also said it will be removing him from all ads “as soon as possible”.

The brother of his partner took to social media where he accused Maboe of domestic violence.

In quick short succession, it appears the 33 year old’s life is spiraling out of control. So does this mean he deserves what is coming to him?

Social media don’t  seem to think so. He cheated – so what?

He doesn’t deserve to lose everything he worked so hard for, seems to be the general mantra on Twitter and this matter should be kept private.

Hold up – let’s break down this mess:

1. This is not Maboe’s first transgression – in 2016 he admitted to kissing Lorna Maseko, which ended in Maseko’s divorce and Maboe separating from his then-partner, in fact he went on radio to talk about this.
2. Maboe is a father
3. STD – Despite Maboe’s claims that the STD was “unproven”, doesn’t it seem fair to give his partner the benefit of the doubt?
4. There are claims of abuse and a potential impending case
5. The woman in question who Maboe had the affair with also reportedly has a family and is married
6. The video was made public

What is interesting is that despite the severity of points of 1 to 5 the twittersphere has chosen to ignore them and merely focus on the one thing that Maboe’s partner allegedly did – record a video and release it to the public, even though it has not been confirmed as to who released the video.

Let’s play devil’s advocate for a second. When Maboe made his first transgression with Lorna Maseko in which he kissed the chef and presenter at a public venue for all to see where a photographer snapped it up, no one was crying foul – it was a joke, tabloid fodder and at the time there was very little sympathy for Katlego’s then partner who was made to look a fool in a public space, while having to deal with the hurt and the shame in private.

Maboe is a “public figure”. I use the term loosely and while he is no Bonang, most of us can barely get through a YouTube video without seeing those OUTsurance ads asking us to Chencha dai ding. Him being in the spotlight is a path he chose and with that comes responsibility.

By default, his own shortcomings should be in the public sphere and the consequences of the alleged STD, infidelity, destruction and chaos should be in the public arena, because Maboe has been in the public eye himself for many years.

So many have asked if Katlego really deserves this. No, the question should be, does his partner deserve this?

The mere fact that the attention of Maboe’s actions is being diverted to his partner’s alleged recording and leaking of the video is one of the biggest looking-glasses into the society we live in:

A man can cheat on you, potentially give you a STD and affect your ability to have children, destroy your family, and put you through an emotional and mental hell but society will still look at women and say: “What did you do, to cause all of this?” and hold men onto some sacred holy cow by saying: “How dare you take away his dignity.”

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