A fake racist profile thought to be propaganda has gone viral but instead of making South Africans fight, its brought them together!
A profile that was called “Tanya Smit” wrote an obscure, controversial post that quickly got South Africa heated on election counting afternoon. The post was being shared thousands of times before speculation weighed in closer to the truth that the account was actually a fake, used to create mayhem.
All the “friends” that were on the account had no idea who she was or how they were connected.
The account posted an incredibly racist remark which sent South African’s from all walks of life into disgust, not at the remarks but at the fact that someone had created a fake profile to maliciously cause anger.
Apparently, the IP address that was connected to the account is in London, which is no where near “Tanya’s” said Cape Town home town.
The profile was quickly deleted but something amazing remained.
All races, belonging to all political parties felt the same & voiced their opinion. South Africans will not stand for racism, no matter who it comes from or who it is directed too.
After the post went viral, people started questioning whether the profile was actually real… as there was just too much that seemed out-of-the-ordinary.
Kyale Boatwright wrote “It’s a fake account! It was created by a guy by the name of Siphe Mzaidume! They traced the I.P address”
Norbert Fuhr agreed “Ive saw that too .. i dont think she is real .. i personally think its a fake profile .. none the less i’ve reported her to my mates on the Budget/Avis Executive Board .. they are already investigating”
Grant Harris stated “It’s a fake account, someone born in 1991. And looks like that and has no photos the accounts fake don’t waste your time with this shit”
Jason Karem made a valid point “We all need to widen up. There’s 100s of these mofos out there that creep onto our profiles. We wouldn’t let them in our houses so why on our Facebooks? Could be a violent criminal. The point with this fake one is I have reason to believe it’s an ANC guerrilla campaign”
Kyale Boatwright “It was shared by person named Ncediwe Deejay Linc from JHB. I’m just making people aware so that there is no social rejection against the elections an the results. Racism is at such a high and if the youth can help I think we should all be heard and stand up against racism so we ALL have a future in S.A”
But it gets even more interesting…
There was only really one person that “Tanya Smit” interacted with since her profile was created in February 2016 – Siphe Mzaidume – who’s profile has also disappeared since yesterday.
Siphe Mzaidume is a name you should all be familiar with.
He is the cricketer that dupped international media into believing that he had been awarded a contract to play overseas… only to find out he hadn’t even played in provisional cricket in South Africa.
Mzaidume’s story very quickly stopped being about transformation and turned into something a little bit more peculiar. With a little bit of digging, it became quite apparent that not only is he a very average cricketer, he’s also prone to tall tales.
There were the team members at the Irish club he played for who revealed that he was fired after four games for not being as good as he claimed he was.
There was Kevin Pietersen’s spokesperson who confirmed that he’d never heard of Mzaidume and had never given him advice, despite his claims to the contrary.
The list of false claims goes on, but the hole also gets deeper.
Mzaidume went from a cricket scandal in the news… to being the guy that has a habit of creating fake profiles.
Loads of them.
The daily Maverick wrote an incredible article about one of Mzaidume first times he got caught out…
A number of his teammates claimed that he was busted for creating fake Facebook accounts to talk himself up. One of them, according to those in the know, is Kate Brezie Bresnan, somebody seemingly pretending to be related to English cricketer Tim Bresnan. Kate curiously hails from Northampton (where Mzaidume started his cricket career). Yet the Bresnan family is from Yorkshire.
The story is being investigated but it seems that the posts which were meant to create controversy may even have had fake accounts interact with each other to “stir the pot” even more.
“JJ Dippenaar” commented on most of the “Tanya Smit” posts with vulgar, racist provocation but a little digging revealed that his profile had only been created in May 2016 and all three profiles shared the same friends.
As a last blow, the company listed on “Tanya Smit” – Budget Car Rental – have released a statement as they have no idea who she is & no record of her working for them.
“Budget Car Rental The company maintains a strict zero tolerance policy towards discrimination. We do not condone or support the comments this individual makes on her own personal site and such comments should in no way be construed as to be the position or view of Budget. Additionally, please note Budget South Africa has confirmed that Tanya Smit is not an employee of Budget.”
An online witch-hunt has started to find the culprits who created the fake profile & many users have started questioning the Penny Sparrow profile too…
Bryan Jacobs “Maybe all of these absurd posts are fake. I mean, who actually talks like that, let alone puts it online for everyone to see. We need to stop these stupid people from trying to make us fight with each other?”
Nthombi Baleka wrote “Guys, this is not the South Africa for us… it seems as though all these racist posts are just part of a bigger political thang trying to make us angry with each other. What if Penny Sparrow is fake too!”
More than that, the online community are doing the opposite of what the post intended… they are coming together to unearth the truth & make sure that every one is aware that fake profiles like this exist.
“Don’t fall for it… they are only used to manipulate South Africans into unnecessarily fighting with each other & we’re all brighter than that.”
Tanya Smit… the fake racist created for controversy uncovered.