{"id":84950,"date":"2025-06-06T14:22:56","date_gmt":"2025-06-06T14:22:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament"},"modified":"2025-06-06T14:32:41","modified_gmt":"2025-06-06T14:32:41","slug":"papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament","title":{"rendered":"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; South-Africa. <\/strong><\/span>MK Party MP Gezani Kobane, popularly known as Papa Penny, has defended himself after receiving backlash for struggling to articulate himself in English during a portfolio committee meeting on sport, arts and culture.<\/p>\n<p>Kobane, who has no formal education, was appointed as an MP last year and is not fluent in English. His home language is Tsonga.<\/p>\n<p>During the meeting, Kobane asked South African Football Association (Safa) officials questions about the fraud and mismanagement case involving Safa funds. However, this left many confused as to what he was trying to say, as he was struggling to pronounce some English words.<\/p>\n<p>This sparked a debate on social media, with many users questioning the standard of parliament and how he was appointed as an MP.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to TimesLIVE, Kobane explained that he wrote his questions in Tsonga and had them translated for the meeting.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe issue is not that I can\u2019t speak English, it\u2019s just not my home language, I\u2019m not English,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>He said he doesn&#8217;t see anything wrong with not being able to speak English perfectly.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don&#8217;t have to speak perfect English because I\u2019m not English. I don\u2019t see anything wrong with whether I\u2019m able to speak English or not, but I\u2019m more comfortable speaking my own language.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Kobane said in future parliamentary meetings he plans to speak in his home language, Tsonga and expects parliament to provide translators.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn future I won\u2019t speak English in parliamentary meetings, I\u2019ll speak my own language&#8230; I want to use my language in parliament as we have 11 official languages.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">South-Africa<\/span> Follow <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; South-Africa. MK Party MP Gezani Kobane, popularly known as Papa Penny, has defended himself after receiving backlash for struggling to articulate himself in English during a portfolio committee meeting on sport, arts and culture. Kobane, who has no formal education, was appointed as an MP last year and is not fluent in English. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":84949,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,12],"tags":[275],"class_list":["post-84950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-policy","tag-south-africa-2"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament - South Africa<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"MK Party MP Gezani Kobane, popularly known as Papa Penny, has defended himself after receiving backlash for struggling t ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"MK Party MP Gezani Kobane, popularly known as Papa Penny, has defended himself after receiving backlash for struggling t ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"South Africa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-06-06T14:22:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-06-06T14:32:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1000\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"666\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-06-06T14:22:56+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-06-06T14:32:41+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament\"},\"wordCount\":289,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"South-Africa\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"policy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament\",\"name\":\"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament - South Africa\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-06-06T14:22:56+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-06-06T14:32:41+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"description\":\"MK Party MP Gezani Kobane, popularly known as Papa Penny, has defended himself after receiving backlash for struggling t ...\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg\",\"width\":1000,\"height\":666,\"caption\":\"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/\",\"name\":\"South Africa\",\"description\":\"Just another Africa News Agency Sites site\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\",\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7417380fa9e23b5c57fdbfdaf3fdf92ee478f759a084addda5faa3732853e74a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7417380fa9e23b5c57fdbfdaf3fdf92ee478f759a084addda5faa3732853e74a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"cfeditoren\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament - South Africa","description":"MK Party MP Gezani Kobane, popularly known as Papa Penny, has defended himself after receiving backlash for struggling t ...","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament","og_description":"MK Party MP Gezani Kobane, popularly known as Papa Penny, has defended himself after receiving backlash for struggling t ...","og_url":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament","og_site_name":"South Africa","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa","article_published_time":"2025-06-06T14:22:56+00:00","article_modified_time":"2025-06-06T14:32:41+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1000,"height":666,"url":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"cfeditoren","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"cfeditoren","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament"},"author":{"name":"cfeditoren","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb"},"headline":"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament","datePublished":"2025-06-06T14:22:56+00:00","dateModified":"2025-06-06T14:32:41+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament"},"wordCount":289,"commentCount":0,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg","keywords":["South-Africa"],"articleSection":["all news","policy"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament","url":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament","name":"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament - South Africa","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg","datePublished":"2025-06-06T14:22:56+00:00","dateModified":"2025-06-06T14:32:41+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb"},"description":"MK Party MP Gezani Kobane, popularly known as Papa Penny, has defended himself after receiving backlash for struggling t ...","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/06\/sm_1749207668.060374.jpg","width":1000,"height":666,"caption":"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/papa-penny-defends-language-struggles-in-parliament#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Papa Penny Defends Language Struggles in Parliament"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/","name":"South Africa","description":"Just another Africa News Agency Sites site","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb","name":"cfeditoren","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7417380fa9e23b5c57fdbfdaf3fdf92ee478f759a084addda5faa3732853e74a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7417380fa9e23b5c57fdbfdaf3fdf92ee478f759a084addda5faa3732853e74a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"cfeditoren"}}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84950","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84950"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84950\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/84949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}