Africa-Press – Eswatini. The Director of Mr Eswatini, Mbonisi Ngcamphalala, has shared that it is not possible for contestants to proceed to the Top 10 without prejudging activities.
Prejudging activities are where contestants are usually screened to see if they are fit to go to the next stage. The screening usually comes in the form of exercises where the contestants’ public speaking abilities and character are vetted to see if they indeed qualify to be the next Mr Eswatini. According to the director, the prejudging activities will contribute 30 per cent to the final mark while votes will contribute 70 per cent.
Competition
The competition kicked off this year in July, when it registered 28 contestants who showed interest in taking the crown. The contestants came from all the regions of the country. Eight of the contestants were unlucky, as the competition recently announced its Top 20 after intense voting, which started on August 1. Currently, the contestants are running for the Top 10 position; however, the competition recently announced that they were actually looking for the Top 15 instead of the Top 10. This causes confusion in the competition as the Top 10 was supposed to be released on Sunday, but instead they announced that they will now be releasing the Top 15 instead of the Top 10 in the competition.In an interview with this publication, the director of Mr Eswatini, explained in detail why there were sudden changes in the competition. “We were supposed to have prejudging activities because when we were voting for the Top 20 we did have the activities to determine if an individual was worthy of proceeding to the next stage besides using votes.
Voting
While we were voting for the Top 10, which we were supposed to release on Sunday, we went for the school outreach activity, whereby my phone was stolen and I couldn’t communicate for a long time. When I got my phone back, it was already late; it was six days before the closing of the Top 10 voting. So we then resolved to extend the date of voting until this coming Sunday.” Ngcamphalala went on to say, “I already have the Top 10, and they are good to go to the next stage. We have now resolved to get a Top 15 because we need to do the prejudging activities because we couldn’t do it early. There was no way for people to proceed to the next stage without the prejudging activities; either way, people were going to be hurt,” Ngcamphalala said. He also shared that the lost cellphone disrupted communication as they were supposed to do the prejudging activities before the Top 10 voting lines were closed.
Communication
“The cellphone disrupted communication when we were supposed to do prejudging. We didn’t have a timeline for the prejudging activities, but they were supposed to be done towards the end of voting for the Top 10. The Top 10 voting lines were closed on Sunday, and we were supposed to do the prejudging activities the week before the closing of voting lines. We couldn’t do them the week before because I couldn’t communicate since I didn’t have a phone. The contestants knew that I didn’t have a phone,” Ngcampalala said. He went on to reveal that there won’t be any voting for the Top 15. “In the Top 15, there won’t be any voting. An individual will prove himself if he is worthy of proceeding to the next stage through the activities that they have to do in their communities. There will be debates, talent shows and public speaking activities where the contestants will be recorded on whether they are able to carry out these activities. This will then help determine if a person is eligible to proceed to the next stage of the competition. Next year, Mr Eswatini has to go and compete in South Africa (SA). We don’t want a person who will arrive there and do nothing. People will question how the individual made it to the Top 10 should he fail to represent us well in SA,” Ngcamphalala said.
Contestants
The director concluded by emphasising that he did engage the contestants about getting into the Top 15 instead of the Top 10. “I told the contestants that I was going to go with the Top 15 because I wanted them to prove their goals and objectives for joining Mr Eswatini. On Saturday, we are going to do the prejudging, which will be a question-and answer session. The following week, I told them they needed to do activities in their communities on their own and then report back to me with videos and numbers that I could call to confirm if a person had done an activity either for a community or for an elderly person. We don’t need Mr Eswatini, who won by votes; we need Mr Eswatini, who is a game changer,” he said.
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