Scrutator
THE euphoria stirred by Egypt’s unprecedented win over Italy at the FIFA Confederations Cup in South Africa quickly died down after the Pharaohs were exposed as mere masqueraders by the United States on Sunday.
But not before the juicy stuff about how the Pharaohs were robbed by scantily dressed ladies presumed to be whores were emblazoned in the media.
As they flew home this week, the Egyptians were blaming “shameful and disgraceful” treatment by the South African media as one of the reasons for their exit.
“We completely reject the reports in the papers. They were shameful and disgraceful,” said Mahmoud Taher, leader of the Egyptian delegation to the Confederations Cup.
“We come from a very religious country and our players are very religious boys and completely disciplined and what has been published had hurt them back home very much.”
Scrutator had a good chuckle.
So “religious” footballers do not bonk?
The last time Scrutator was in the ancient cradle of civilisation her male friend had a good time at a secretive brothel.
Of course with the conservative climate in Egypt, the social phenomenon is increasingly hidden and not easily observed.
Prostitution rings catering to travelling businessmen are known to operate out of private apartments, while other prostitutes frequent the large hotels with a high percentage of foreigners.
Egyptian footballers, idolised in the Arab country, are also known to patronise these brothels.
In any case, who doesn’t know how some sportsmen celebrate success by bingeing and engaging in sexual orgies — be they Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Scientologists, Baha’ian or Satanists?
But wait a minute.
The papers were obviously desperate to downplay the theft which they feared would play into the hands of critics already worried about South Africa’s alarming crime rate ahead of next year’s World Cup.
I’m sure we all noticed how the boys looked too jaded to even finish the match against the United States on Sunday.
If mere “shameful” stories about prostitutes can make a supposedly strong team surrender so meekly, we might have a solution to Likuena’s perennial failure on the international football arena.
Scrutator humbly suggests that all newspapers in Lesotho connive to fabricate stories about Likuena’s next opponents bringing whores to their hotel rooms on the eve of an important match.
Better still, we could recruit the sisters who prowl our street corners at night and set them on our opponents when they visit Maseru.
What a week it has been!
First there were two brothers who spent three hours of radio time attacking me.
Their diatribe was shocking to say the least and such venom has no place in any contemporary society.
There were also some cheap shots fired at me by scribes at that outpost of antediluvian journalism.
Their attempt to sully Scrutator’s sparklingly clean reputation was so trivial that I am beginning to wonder if that is all they have to offer.
But first let’s deal with the rancour that emanated from 95.6.
I will not dignify the two gentlemen’s laughable ideas by responding at length because I happen to know that readers are too smart to entertain that claptrap.
By the way, Scrutator is not one to be moved by mobocracy.
I can fight my own battles and win them fair and square without renting a brother to fight in my corner.
What really made the whole programme laughable was that two guys were ganging up to spew vitriol for three hours against a mere columnist.
I must admit that their harassment slightly irritated me until I realised I was missing the whole game plan.
It pays to be associated with Scrutator.
In fact, I can boldly say with no jot of doubt that the station is riding on my popularity.
Scrutator’s juggernaut is just unstoppable.
They are harassing me so that they can boost their waning audience figures.
Another laughable attempt to use the propaganda of association came from that weak weekly which claims to always “stand by their stories” no matter how many boobs they dish out.
I had a good laugh when I noticed how they were at pains to avoid mentioning the name Lesotho Times in one of their stories.
Those who are rubbing their callused hands with glee anticipating an apology are in for a very long wait.
As for that barrister, I can only say I know the real “evil that men do”.
It’s when a whole man borrows money from a tiny society and disappears into thin air without paying back a dime.
I thought stealing elections was an African phenomenon until I watched the events that have unfolded in Iran over the past days.
By all accounts what we saw in Iran a fortnight ago was a sham election.
I am not alone in passing this verdict.
Iranians believe they were robbed of their votes in a poll that saw Mahmoud Ahmadinejad controversially retained as president.
Iranians questioned how about 40 million votes had been counted and results declared so soon after the polls closed on Friday.
To the Iranians’ credit there was no “meticulous verification” like what we saw in Zimbabwe last March.
The results were announced pronto!
But there was an indecent haste to announce the winner, raising fears that something was amiss.
This torched fierce protests unseen since the 1979 Iranian revolution.
The protests have left scores dead.
Bizarrely for Ahmadinejad this is quite normal.
“Some believed they would win, and then they got angry,” Ahmadinejad said. “It is like the passions after a football match.”
Remember the fiasco in Zimbabwe?
Talk about passion for dictatorship!
