Sunday World's Questionable Reporting

Yesterday I got myself a copy of Sunday World as I was advised that the Sunday paper would be running the story about our company's launch which happened last week Wednesday. The edition was headlined by a story that kept social media abuzz with the claims by the paper that TS Record is exploiting Zahara and have reduced South Africa's biggest musician at the moment to being a maid. 

The scathing report on TS Records claimed that two independent sources, who formerly worked closely with TS Records, confirm that Zahara is often made to perform household chores at the Nciza home.

The paper alleges that the Mkutukana family, especially Zahara's siblings Nomonde and Mbangedwa, claim a number of promises that were made to them by the record company have not been fulfilled.

They say, among other things, that she is not in control of her finances, still stays in Nciza's home, where she is allegedly treated like a servant, after being promised a house and she sometimes gets so desperate for money that she has to ask her 55-year-old mom for cash for airtime. - writes Sunday World. 

I was shocked, saddened and disgusted that in this day and age, when we expect black owned recording companies to be taking care of our artists and making sure that they do not die as paupers as it had been the norm for our fallen legends in the industry, TS Records would commit such despicable acts. 

Well, that was until I turned the page to an article about our launch and realised that one should always take whatever the paper prints with some reservations. For some odd reason the journo seems to have thought that the launch was AJ's CD launch. 

I fail to comprehend how anyone who was at The Venue in Melrose Arch on that night could think the event was AJ's launch. It was very clear on the invitation and during the proceedings for the evening that we were launching Londiwe. 

Furthermore, our MC announced on numerous occasion that our company D-Londs had partnered with 999 Music to put the event together. My partner and I were even called on stage to be introduced to the guests. 

How the journo missed all that and I assumed that we were also launching AJ is beyond me. 

The pictures of Londiwe were on the projector through out all the performances before she started her performance. Which then begs the question; was this just a mistake or did the journo not care about being accurate?

The paper always claims that they have contacted "sources" so then if the journo was confused why could she/he not try and ascertain the facts by calling someone to get clarity?

We worked hard to put the event together. It was a shock to us and the people who had helped us to make the evening a success that Sunday World would write that this was AJ's launch.

That said, I would like to thank everyone who came through to our launch to support us. Our sponsors, 999 Music, our friends and the media... thank you!

I would also like to thank Sunday World for the compliments they paid Londiwe and her performance. 

Your support has truly inspired us to push even further. Our company is working on even more projects to highlight young talent. We are truly committed and working very hard to see that our dream of igniting change in this business would be realised. 

With your continued support not even the sky is the limit.