Controversial Xitsonga musician and president of Action Alliance Development Party, Benny Mayengani, is facing the music for waxing defamatory lyrics against revered radio guru James Shikwambana on social media.
Sunday World can exclusively reveal that Shikwambana obtained an interim protection order against Mayengani at the Polokwane magistrate’s court on January 20.
This comes after the potty-mouthed Mayengani claimed on social media that Shikwambana, who is the managing director of Power FM and Capricorn FM, left his previous job at Munghana Lonene FM, where he was the station manager, because he was “corrupt”.
Mayengani apparently spewed his bile when accusing Munghana Lonene, which is a Tsonga station, of promoting Sepedi instead of Tsonga artists.
Munghana Lonene’s choice to use Master KG’s hit song Keneilwe as the song of the year to usher its listeners into the year 2024 is what caused his gibberish.
When launching the impetuous broadside, which had the potential to fuel tribalism, Mayengani also dragged Shikwambana, who, as a result, obtained an interim protection order against him. The multi-award-winning former sports commentator Shikwambana stated in the protection order, which we have seen, that he asked Baloyi to provide proof of his defamatory claims against him before going to court, but he was unable to do so.
“But people who follow him believe that I left the SABC because I fought with him as a result of being corrupt,” reads the protection order.
He stated that Mayengani’s public utterances have caused untold and irreparable damage to his reputation.
He claimed that if the court did not forbid the musician from tarnishing his reputation, his integrity would be at risk.
The singer’s inflammatory remarks, added the eloquent former commentator, have also taken an emotional toll on him and his family.
“The past few days have been very emotionally draining to me, my wife, children, my 78-year-old mother, and my siblings,” he stated in the protection order.
Given that Mayengani’s horde of fans tried to assail him in 2015, he claimed that his life would be in jeopardy if he did not halt him.
“He will also be putting a threat into my own life because his followers can harm me physically, as they have tried in 2015.”
He pleaded with the court to bar Mayengani from contacting him via WhatsApp, text message, or calling him after receiving the protection order.
Additionally, he asked that the order stop the musician from making voicenotes or videos about him and posting them to social media.
Mayengani, who left the EFF in 2016 to join the ANC, is scheduled to appear in the Polokwane magistrate’s court on April 17 to provide justification for the temporary order’s denial.
The court warned him that the order would be made permanent if he failed to show up in court to oppose it.
Attempts to get a comment from Shikwambana drew a blank as he ignored our phone calls and text messages.
