Yvonne Chaka Chaka’s fall from grace turns ugly

There are some strange aspects to the hasty departure of South African singer Yvonne Chaka Chaka from Uganda on New Year’s Eve.

According to the Ugandan police, who issued a video statement, she was “deported” from the country because she had failed to comply with its immigration laws. The Ugandans say that she came into their country on an ordinary visa, yet by performing in a new year concert there she would have been on a working visit, requiring an employment visa.

That all seems logical – after all, sovereign countries are entitled to decide who they admit past their borders. However, even in the face of the official statement, Chaka Chaka was still insisting that she had not been deported. She had decided to return home, she claimed, because she did “not understand” what was happening.

But then she went further to say that reports of the incident were “fake news and hate speech”. A more absurd statement would be hard to imagine, because the deportation story was clearly true, having been confirmed by Ugandan authorities. But perhaps she was suggesting that anyone criticising a South African is committing “hate speech”.

This whole fuss is, to us, completely symptomatic of the arrogance of South Africa’s elite – be they in politics, business or the arts – when it comes to our fellow Africans.

At the same time, though, there is the possibility that the deportation of Chaka Chaka may have been in some way related to her outspoken support for that country’s rebel politician and musician, Bobi Wine.

In 2018, she said Wine was Uganda’s Nelson Mandela…something which would not have gone down well in a country tightly controlled by President Yoweri Museveni and his ruling party.

Whatever the real reasons for her explusion, Chaka Chaka has handled it badly. That’s the truth – it’s not fake news or hate speech.

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