e.tv Africa’s Scandal! (Monday to Thursday 8.30pm) continues to offer telenovela-phobes reasons to believe in television that entertains, educates and informs. One of the current storylines is quite a hair-raiser. An HIV infected mother is being bullied into selling her ARVs to drug addictswho then powder the pills into a concoction called “whoonga”. Now that is so low we guys, notorious for for re-exporting the life extending drugs and swindling Global Fund monies are yet to sink to. The mother is now being being blackmailed with the loss of her baby if her ARV supply to the drug dealers stops. The plot does not get any worse than “whoonga” addicts infecting themselves with HIV in order to make it on the list of people receiving freebie ARVs. The reprieve is that the dedicated journos at the now rag-turned serious Scandal! are sleuthing the issue Hopefully, the bad guys will get their due, perhaps a jail term with the keys thrown in the sea.

Illegal immigration is also the focus in another Scandal! subplot. As Africa’s biggest economy, South Africa continues to inadvertently attract illegals who have sadly been on the receiving end of neo-apartheid vices like the infamous xenophobic attacks. You have to hand it to the villainious Daniel Nyati (played by Generation’s Archie Moroka) for fishing an opportunity to advance his own interests a la offering pro bono legal counsel to desperate illegals. His team of paralegals are final year university law students wishing to improve their GPAs. But being the shrewd fellow he is, Nyati has offered the illegals a quid pro quo. In exchange for the legal counsel, they have to offer their labour for a building project he says will provide a subsidised roof over their heads. Not strange from a honey-tongued man that believes decent accommodation is a basic human right.