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Watch The B’Dazzling Story of Bonang Matheba on our YouTube channel here or below.
Introduction
It is undisputed that Hollywood is the pinnacle of the entertainment industry worldwide and once you make a name for yourself there, best believe you have also made it in the rest of the world.
Over the past two decades, we have seen several African stars breaking into the global market, especially from two African countries namely South Africa and Nigeria but in this video, we shall keep it home, and by home, we are talking about South Africa.
From musicians and actors to media personalities and more, the past decade has seen South African stars establishing themselves in the international market including notable names such as Trevor Noah, Black Coffee, Thuso Mbedu, Tyla, and more, but in this video, our focus is Mzansi’s original IT girl, Bonang Matheba aka Queen B.
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Birth of Bonang Matheba
On June 25, 1987, in Mahikeng, a city in the North West province of South Africa, a mother working in the HR department of a large agribusiness company and a father who was a senior lecturer at the University of North West welcomed their newly born daughter, Bonang Dorothy Matheba.
Bonang’s parents would later divorce leading to her relocation to Leondale, a suburb in the east of Johannesburg, South Africa where she went to complete her secondary education at Fourways High School.
From a very young age, Bonang was always the shining star excelling in her school’s Netball first team with full colors, scoring her first TV gig at 15 years old on SABC2’s youth program, Manhattan’s Fantasy Challenge, and more!
As her TV career had not taken off, after completing high school, Bonang went on to enroll at the University of Johannesburg well known as UJ where she studied for a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing.
In 2007 she finally got her big break when she joined SABC1’s music show LIVE, later renamed to Live Amp, where she caught Mzansi’s eyeballs and earned her title of being the original “IT girl” we mentioned earlier in this video for her outstanding performance on the show.
As she was becoming more popular during her days on LIVE and wanting to explore her promising TV career full-time, Bonang decided to drop out of university which disappointed her parents but would later prove to be one of the best life-changing decisions that she took for herself and her family..
From 2008 to 2010 she dabbled in fashion collaborating with big clothing brands such as Legit, and also got her first taste of radio when she landed a weekend spot on YFM.
In 2011 she became the first South African celebrity to launch her online reality show called B*Dazzled which continues to air on her YouTube channel to this day.
In the same year, she became the first black South African to feature on the June issue cover of FHM South Africa which further gave a boost to her fast-growing career.
In 2012, 5 years after joining LIVE, she decided to leave the music show for greener pastures where she joined the luxury lifestyle and travel show Top Billing which used to air on SABC3.
In 2013, Bonang signed more lucrative deals with international cosmetic giant Revlon as their beauty ambassador before collaborating with Woolworths on her luxury lingerie line “Distraction by Bonang” the following year.
In the same year as her Woolworths collaboration, she joined one of the popular SABC radio stations Metro FM where she was the host of the super successful mid-morning show called: The Front Row.
Queen B continued to do the most in 2014, becoming the first South African to host the MTV European Music Awards pre-show and once again, landing on the cover of Glamour South Africa as the magazine’s first black South African cover star.
In 2017 she released her autobiography, From A to B, which made headlines for its spelling, factual, and grammatical errors leading to its quick pullback from bookstores and replaced with a second edition.
That same year, Bonang premiered her hit reality show Being Bonang on Vuzu which was renewed for a second season in 2018.
For most of 2017, Bonang continued to make waves and cement herself as a force to be reckoned with in local entertainment signing more deals with big brands such as Cell C.
Just in 2019 alone, Bonang won the coveted Award for Best Inspiration and Influence at the prestigious Global Social Awards held in Prague, Czech Republic.
She also won Africa Influencer of the Year at the first-ever E! Entertainment People’s Choice Awards, held in LA, California.
The beginning of 2020 saw Bonang being dubbed one of Forbes’ 50 Most Powerful Women in Africa, also gracing the March issue cover of Forbes Women Africa.
In March 2019, Bonang launched her very own luxury beverage brand, HOUSE OF BNG, which was an instant success and was constantly sold out in all parts of South Africa.
Bonang’s presence on screen during 2019 included the third season of her reality show “Being Bonang”, the award-winning documentary “Public Figure” (in which Bonang starred and co-produced) as well as her episode in “Activate”, the six-part National Geographic documentary series about Global Citizen’s efforts to eradicate poverty by 2030.
When she’s not on the red carpet or in front of the camera, Bonang is a prominent ambassador for Global Citizen and also heads up the Bonang Matheba Bursary Fund which aims to put 300 girls through tertiary education by 2025.
2021 saw her Bonang relocating to New York for about a year to fulfill a lifelong dream. She kept a fairly low profile on social media during her stay in NYC but would occasionally give the B-Force, her fans, a glimpse of her new life.
In 2023 she starred in season 2 of Netflix’s Young, Famous & African reality show, released in May.
She hosted Miss South Africa which was broadcast live on SABC3 and saw the channel peaking at over 1 million views, which was the first time since 2021.
She graced the cover of Glamour South Africa’s 2023 spring issue while continuing to work with huge brands such as Gucci but the biggest highlight and what she referred to as one of the biggest moments of her career was walking the runway for L’Oreal in Paris.
As of March 2024, she hasn’t publicly shared a lot about what she has been busy with but we know she has been fairly in overseas and in South Africa.
On her social media, she celebrated the 5th anniversary of her brand, House of BNG, which also partnered with SA Style Awards 2024.
It is undeniable that Bonang walked so that the ones who came after her could easily run but what makes her journey even more special is that she came back and ran on the same path that she paved. She has managed to cement her brand and stay relevant throughout all generations to this day which is something that’s not easy to achieve in the South African entertainment industry.
READ: The Origin, Rise and Impact of Amapiano, A South African Sound | PROFILED
