On Friday, a projected $1.7-million deal between famed comedian Trevor Noah and a South African tourism council for a five-minute advertisement to promote travel provoked outrage in his home nation.
The Tourism Business Council of South Africa (TBCSA) launched a plan earlier this week to have the Emmy Award-winning comedian promote South Africa as a tourism destination.
The expensive price tag, however, sparked a storm of criticism of the government, coming at a time when power outages are wreaking havoc on Africa’s most industrialised nation and people are struggling with rising food and fuel bills.
The government says it is neither paying for nor sponsoring the advert.
Tourism Minister Patricia de Lille stated on Twitter, which has been relaunched as X, that the “Trevor Noah advertisement for South Africa ‘does not involve public funds.'”
The TBCSA, a private umbrella tourism organization, stated that the proposed agreement would be “wholly funded” by the organization “if and when the parties eventually agree on a common strategy.”
The advertisement tries to revitalize the country’s devastated tourism industry, which has yet to fully recover from the coronavirus pandemic.
South Africans, on the other hand, have taken to X to express their misgivings and skepticism over the proposed deal.
“South African Tourism & Tourism Ministry are looking for creative ways to loot out taxpayer’s money,” @Thuso1Africa posted.
“Paying Trevor Noah R33 Million for a 5 minute ad when I’m losing 5 hours of electricity almost daily is crazy business,” posted @riley_unlocked.
The former “The Daily Show” host is now on tour in South Africa, with stops in the United States, India, and the United Kingdom.
In his best-selling memoir “Born a Crime,” Noah chronicled his life in apartheid-era South Africa as the son of a black South African mother and a white Swiss-German father.