Johannesburg - Media personality Khanyi Mbau is in a 13-part reality series The Big Secret, that is now showing on BET Africa. The show gives ordinary South Africans a platform to share their darkest secrets to help free themselves from emotional burdens. We caught up with the star to talk about the show.
How has the journey on the show been?
The journey has been such a thought piece where I had to draw myself within myself to realise that as South Africans we are going through a lot.
How do you deal with all the secrets that you come across?
I take it every time as a new page. I never know what these people are going to tell me and I always apply myself and say, ‘Khanyi, If you were in their shoes what would you do.’ And that is where I come from. But I also appreciate them for trusting me enough to open up and show me their true selves.
What has the entire journey taught you?
It has taught me that as South Africans, as much as we are free we have not been taught what to do with our freedom. We are a nation that fought for everythingwe have t oday, so these secrets are a contribution to our lack of understanding and self love. I feel like South Africa needs to have a different dialogue. Instead of fighting each other in terms of val- ues and in terms of (our) standing in society, we need to fight for the values of self love.
South Africans have gone through so much, but we haven’t sat down as a nation and tried to cultivate (these questions of) ‘who are we now that we are here’ and ‘what are we about?’. And (find) the true definition of freedom. It goes back to that.
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What can people expect to get from the show?
I think that in each and every person that I have met in the 13 episodes, there is a little bit of all of us. It is really going to start giving people things to think about and really open conversations within oneself.
As a media personality who’s been non-apologetic and frankly non-secretive about your own life. How do you think you have evolved as a person?
To be quite honest with you, I have always maintained who I am. I think that it is society that has evolved to try and fit me (into it).
Not to blow my own horn but everything I have done in the beginning is still the same thing I am doing now. It was viewed as taboo eg with the father of my child, dating somebody older who has a lot of money, but I look at society now and it is norm - we call them blessers, we call them people who enable women to be great. So I would feel that you have evolved not me.
How would you advise people on set- ting themselves free from their secrets?
You can never advise anyone on setting themselves free, it is a state of mind that one gets to and everyone gets that moment where they hear the inner voice that allows them to be.