Given’s do collapses into dis-function as Cyril ducks
● Imagine throwing an expensive party, inviting a few hundred top VIPs and roping in radio and TV to cover it live — and your guest of honour fails to pitch.
That happened on Thursday night when Given Mkhari’s much-touted Industrial Development Corporation sponsored Chairman’s Conversation with President Cyril Ramaphosa blew up like a highveld thunderstorm.
We were gathered at that fancy new spot, the Houghton Hotel in Joburg’s northeast, for what was meant to be an insightful chat with No 1.
Instead we had to listen to Given, chair of MSG Afrika and hosting station Power FM, lock down his composure in a smart blue suit and red tie, and ’fess up to why Cyril was a no-show.
Two NGOs, the Soul City Institute for Social Justice and Wise 4 Afrika, had written to the president to ask him to withdraw from the event because of concerns about gender-based violence relating to Given.
In 2018, Given’s wife, Ipeleng Mkhari, laid an assault charge against him after an argument in their home. The charge was later withdrawn and the couple said they had chosen to resolve the matter privately. But the NGOs said they felt the president’s participation in the event would be “in poor taste” — particularly as the world is in the midst of the UN’s 16 Days of Activism for No Violence against Women and Children campaign.
Given said that “we fully respect and fully accept the decision of the leadership of our country” — but pointed out that similar complaints had been made last year around the time of his Conversation with Johann Rupert.
When Given finished talking, Ipeleng got up on stage to give her husband a kiss and thank us all for coming.
One of the guests left flummoxed was businesswoman Judi Nwokedi, who said she disagreed with Given’s standpoint that what happened was a “private matter”.
“Gender-based violence is not a private matter — nor is any form of abuse. If we hear a woman scream next door as he stabs her again and again, we cannot stand in our living room and say it is a private matter,” she said. Judi’s own business partner is awaiting the outcome of Commission for Gender Equality mediation over their film company’s links to a director accused of rape and sexual misconduct.
On to the rest of the guests, and Judi chats to Philisiwe Mthethwa, who heads the National Empowerment Fund, which funded serial business flopper Khanyi Dhlomo’s Luminance venture (Khanyi paid them back after selling her share to multimillionaire partner Judy Dlamini). Johanna Mukoki arrives after Given’s speech, her black cocktail number bedecked with Versace trinkets. “You’re joking!” exclaims the high-flyer when I tell her what went down.
I catch up with Bonnke Shipalana, whose Communications Firm had the tough gig of spinning the dis-function. I spot Power FM’s Ursula Chikane, Yvonne Chaka Chaka’s doctor husband Tiny Mhinga and radio veteran Bob Mabena, who looks like he’s come straight from the gym.
What to do but have drinks, chatter about what could have been, and snack on canapes including chicken fritters, mini burgers and cocktail-friendly bowls of penne arrabbiata.