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Ayanda Borotho slams myths around ilobolo practice

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Ayanda Borotho. (Photo: Ayanda Borotho Facebook)
Ayanda Borotho. (Photo: Ayanda Borotho Facebook)

Actress Ayanda Borotho says as Africans there’s so much unlearning of what we believe to be true around the issue of lobola.

The actress says the issue came to her attention when she came across a conversation where a guy said, “Women must know their place, especially after a man has paid lobola”. She points out that this was not the first time she’s heard such narrative regarding the practice.

This didn’t sit well with Ayanda and so she made an Instagram video where she discusses the matter with Nobuntu Webster.

Read more: Ayanda Borotho’s letter to her younger self: ‘It wasn’t your fault’

“We are a beautiful people with a distorted and manipulated history, which is unfortunate because women always bear the brunt of ‘culture’. Did you know that the way we practised lobola today is not only false in its representation, but is also offensive to who we are as an African people? [sic],” she said.

She goes on to add that what we have come to know about this practice is not what it was meant to be. She is clear about a few things, though: “Women were not treated as commodities. Africans did not put value on a human life. A man understood that he had to earn his queen, not buy her to own so he could do as he pleased.”

Read more: Isibaya actress Ayanda Borotho shares her opinion on HHP family feud with his wife

The Isibaya actress then explains the intention of the practice with Nobuntu, who agreed with her.

“Ilobolo was a presentation of honour to the family. Men were not trying to prove that they could take care of the women (women could take care of themselves) and men knew this. The gesture of ilobolo was to honour the woman and her family for seeing him as worthy of her,” she explains.

Watch the full video here.

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