Excitement has been in the air for the past few weeks as television audiences countdown to the premiere of the much anticipated Tshedza Production’s upcoming isiXhosa telenovela, Gqeberha. However, the excitement on Friday, 13 January 2023, was subdued.
Read more: SK Khoza Expresses His Gratitude To His Fans And Family
Read more: SK Khoza Expresses His Gratitude To His Fans And Family
This is as the day marked the end of a seven season run for the popular telenovela The Queen. Throughout its run, it is arguable that the decline in terms of the reception of the telenovela came off the back of the “great exit” of beloved fan-favourite characters that left the telenovela back in 2020.
However, as the end of the telenovela played out. The storyline played out with a familiar storyline which saw SK Khoza return to his role as Shaka Khoza and live to tell yet another story.
The many lives of Shaka Khoza
As The Queen wrapped its seven season run with its series finale. It marked the return of fan-favourite cast members of yesteryear. The last to make their return was SK Khoza and Shaka Khoza. He returned just in time for the final showdown between Harriet, Brutus and Londiwe.
He along with Brutus, Harriet and Kagiso were fighting the battle royale with Londiwe following Londiwe killing almost everyone who was a cast member of the telenovela for the past couple of weeks. As such, during the finale moments of the showdown, Harriet would kill Londiwe asserting that, “There can only be one queen.”
However, just moments before, Brutus had attempted to shoot at Londiwe. However, while firing shots in the air ended up shooting a stray which would “kill” Shaka as Kagiso craddled his cousin during what we believed was his final moments. But as the final credits were about to roll, The Queen revealed that Shaka did not die.
Much to delight and surprise of fans. As such, many took to the timeline to share just how many times Shaka has died and come back to life on The Queen.
However, while this was a nod to Shaka’s multiple resurrections on the telenovela, he first died on the series was not due to storyline purposes. As reported at the time:
Reports have emerged that Sthembiso “SK” Khoza, who plays 'Shaka' on The Queen, has been shown the door by the show effective immediately.
The actor’s time on the show has been hanging on by a bare thread for quite some time now. Fans have been calling for his cancellation ever since he came online to confess that he had been emotionally abusing his then fiancée, dental practitioner Ayanda Hlongwane. In the since deleted Instagram post, he said he had been taking his frustrations out on her, and he had just realised it was wrong of him.
Read more: Mzansi Wants To Cancel SK Khoza Again
Shortly later, reports emerged that he had gone further to physically assault her too. The news broke after he was allegedly arrested when Ayanda filed assault charges against him. Although neither of them would address the incident directly in public, they deleted pictures of each other on their social media pages and unfollowed each other. Fans took this as confirmation that the two had broken up.
Image credit: ZAlebs