Imagine a storyboard. They catch them. There are seven of them. #BhekiCele turns up. Is that a feather in his cap? There is press there like paparazzi. Cameras flash. It’s all ridiculous. Celebrations because they caught them. Well, one would swear Bheki and his hat caught them, he didn’t, but you’d swear he did. Welcome to electioneering of a different kind. #CrimeVultures.

I’m Tonya Khoury and I’m clawing the surface to find the truth. Join me as we wrap up a ridiculous week in the media.

#AKA had a relationship with a woman called #Anele, remember her? She “jumped” off a building. It is alleged that her father told #AKA never to enter Durban again or there would be consequences. I’m not sure how poor #Tibz got caught in the crossfire, but as soon as #AKA got to Durbs and showed himself on social media, he was dead. A drive by shooting, clearly a hit. That was a year ago, almost to the day. And now we caught them, on the anniversary of #AKA and #Tibz’s death. #BhekiCele paraded around like a crow, with a puffed out chest and that feather. Somehow, I don’t buy it. And I’m sure neither do you. Two of the accused are in prison serving time for other offences, and when the remaining six turned up in court masked and hooded, the judge was unimpressed. He told them to “unmask” themselves. Ah, the irony. This is the #ANC making sure we don’t have another #SenzoTrial and keeping the hat on #Bheki’s head. The defense team costs an arm and a leg, so where did these guys get the money from? It’s alleged that they received 800k for the hit. That’s going to last about three days in court with advocates of this standing. #Bheki, oi! You didn’t unmask anything mate, we see you and the #CrimeVultures.

Staying on the subject of storyboards, when I first saw the missing posters on social media about #Joslin with her pretty green eyes and her precious smile, my heart ached. In my head I thought “another child gone”. But the posters kept appearing and then the news media started talking about it and then there were rumours flying around and social media was trending and then a little girl actually mattered. She mattered so much that #GaytonMackenzie went to interview her mother in a restaurant and streamed it live on TikTok. Her mom looked so excited; it was sick. She admitted that her and her partner were on tik but they’d been clean for a week. She never cried, she never even swallowed hard, she just promised Gayton she’d go to rehab if they found her child. #CrimeVultures. Then the heat cooled, and the police slowed down their search as time relentlessly marched on. Enter the #DA, with posters to boot. They were saving #Joshlin, no I didn’t make a spelling error, her real name is spelt with an H. Yet, all those posters, all those printed calls for help, spelt her name wrong. I don’t suppose that matters. Especially when a six-year-old child is missing. The DA said that Cape Town was sending an “experienced” team to find the nation’s child. Two nights ago, the mother needed police protection. Why? The community turned vigilante and blamed her and her boyfriend for Joshlin’s disappearance. #CrimeVultures with an agenda.

Look I get it, it’s a time to be visually seen to do the right thing during elections and I suppose murders and missing children make a good headline – if you fix it. I personally don’t believe that they found the hitmen in the #AKA drama, nor do I believe that Joshlin’s mom is clean or that she doesn’t know where her child is, but I’m a cynic. I’m a washing machine of headlines and most times it’s just paper mâché, after the spin. Very disturbing.

Speaking of spin, there was a #busCrash after the ANC manifesto launch. Of course, #Ramaphosa was heavily involved with the victim’s families. Perhaps the driver, who said he was not fit to drive, should have been allowed to rest. That would have been a good start.

Both the #EFF and the #ANC filled up stadiums this week. I laughed when I saw a chick in an EFF t-shirt vibing at the stadium and then a couple of days later the same chick flaunting an ANC t-shirt with a chicken drumstick in her hand. No one is fooled guys, you should have used that money and done something positive in a community, like clean the water in #Giyani which has been tested and found to be poisonous. If you fixed that you wouldn’t have to move ninety odd thousand people dressed in t-shirts, instead, you’d have hundreds of thousands of voters. We’re wide-awake here!  Over one million new voters have registered. We are not sleeping, oh no.

We found 188 voters registered to the same address and all sorts of shenanigans are going on at the IEC. The #MKParty was late with its admin, so they might not be on the roll. No drumroll, it doesn’t matter. The #DA continued to bang on about #CadreDeployment and spend thousands on legal matters for an issue we are completely aware of. What’s the point? There is none. Then the minister of electricity tells us we are on the right track. I think, sir, you’ll find that this is not #Transnet, stage 4 across the country is not the right track at all. Talking about #Transnet, there’s a new CEO. Watch this space. Julius has been on so many radio stations, he’s a media monitor’s dream. He even said he loves white people. Yip, the flip flop continues. At least he’s not scavenging on crimes without a solution.

And then, without a whisper, Chief Justice Raymond #Zondo announced his retirement. Really? I mean seriously? The prez nominated Deputy Chief Justice Maya. I like her but I don’t like how this has played out. I mean the only person who had any sort of arrest or court case from the whole of #StateCapture is #AngeloAgrizzi. He’s been found fit to stand trial by the way, but I don’t think he should. I think he should be treated like the whistleblower he was. The man told us everything, named all the super crooks and HE gets to go to jail. Come on we’re leaving carcasses everywhere and it’s ninety days until elections. Hey ANC, your crime list is in three perfectly bound documents that were handed over in three ceremonies by #RaymondZondo. Go get em china. You won’t though, you’d rather fill up a stadium or appoint a friendly chief justice. Ouch, sorry shots definitely fired. I do like #Maya, I do.

Listen South Africa, if you don’t know who to vote for there is a new app, a dating app. Where you can date your political party. You ask the questions, and you swipe left or right just like on Tinder. The app will match you with the party you are most aligned to. First question? Do dating apps work? Who funded the app? Please don’t download this rubbish, read the manifestoes, take time to understand what is offered to our country and then hold your party accountable. #ElectionDeflection.

I’ve run out of words, can you believe it? I didn’t cover Vodacom saying that the Constitutional Court of our country was delusional as they appeal #Makate’s case. There were 500 rhinos poached in South Africa last year, 370 from my neighbour #Hluhluwe. The only reason white rhinos are still around is because of private game farms. Sick. Talking of sick, healthcare workers march on Union buildings while the sick are left in their beds. #Gordhan had a fight with parliament about #SAA and #Newzroom Africa are in a bit of trouble, you can see it on the screen, no one needed to write about it. And then a 41-year- old man was given life for raping a five-year-old. After the trauma he gave her a one rand coin. #SAPS head office in Johannesburg has been condemned, deemed as unfit for humans. What does that even mean? Is it fit for squirrels? The uniforms won’t fit. You should see the state of the place, not a working toilet or a corner unmarked by rot. In stark contrast the King is getting a new palace, our king just to be clear, the King of the Zulu nation. While eThekwini has no water and people are starving? He might as well have said, let them eat cake. #ElectionWithoutDirection. Finally, this wraps it up for SA news and social media: We learnt that two billion was paid for the SANDF’s presence in the DRC. That’s basically how much we value our soldier’s lives. Sorry, that was a low blow.

Over the waters, well it’s been hectic. Google have an AI model that is racist, basically when you put in anything bad it produces a black person in the image. #Elon had a word and apparently, they’re fixing it. It was leap day, whatever, Gregorian calendars have never made much sense to me. #JacobRothschild died, now we wait for the vultures to come out. Ghana officially “banned” the #LBGT community. There’s one woman who can do no wrong in my eyes and that’s #ClareDaly, she’s the Irish chick that tore shreds into the UN Veto system and this week she painted an ugly picture of #Navalny. More than one hundred Palestinians died as they ran toward the aid trucks in what is being called the #FlourMassacre. Scores were shot and others were run over by trucks. More bodies for the death toll. Jordan airdropped food close to the sea and the scramble of people to get to the aid was heartbreaking. The world shouts loudly and clearly, yet, not a single Arab nation, let alone other nations, stand up to #Netanyahu. Week after next is #Ramadan, the holy month for Muslims. The month of charity, the month of feeding the poor and the month we pray together. But there is no redline here. I don’t believe that even #Ramadan will stop this one-sided war. Joe #Biden has reportedly had words with #Bibi and there are rumours that the two are not getting along so well. Here’s why… it’s election time in the US, too, and the bodies of children dead or starving doesn’t make a great campaign especially when your audience is wide awake. I saw Biden, the chop, with an ice-cream in his hand. You know when you’re about to lick that cone, well the question caught him there, in the throat with his tongue out. Here he stood, not sure which room he was in, ice-cream half licked and no answer to #GazaGenocide. There’s a reason they call him #GenocideJoe, but let’s not forget that his opponent, #Trump, was the one who walked into Jerusalem and named it the capital of Israel.

I leave you with the heart-breaking story of #AaronBushnell. A 25-year-old US Airforce serviceman. He stood in front of the gates of the Israeli Embassy in Washington and said this: “I will no longer be complicit in genocide. I’m about to engage in an extreme act of protest but compared to what people have been experiencing in Palestine at the hands of their colonisers, it’s not extreme at all.” He then doused himself with a flammable substance and set himself alight. While he burnt to death he shouted #FreePalestine. Instead of rushing to get douse the flames the guard at the gates pointed his gun at the burning man. #RIPAaronBushnell

That’s a horrific way to end the weekly report, I just work here and read the news so you don’t have to. Thank you for circling the wounds of this week with me. I’ll definitely be getting deep under #KZN waters this weekend, far from the vultures, maybe I’ll even see some sharks, the good kind. I’m Tonya Khoury and this is this week’s Acumen Media report.