"We're not the African Kardashians," say Nelson Mandela's granddaughters of reality show that sounds like the African Kardashians

By Sean O'Neal | September 29, 2011 | 7:13pm

Aux Features TV

Nelson Mandela survived nearly three decades in a South African prison, and upon his release worked more tirelessly than ever to bring equality and a democratic voice to an oppressed people. And now all of his various trials are finally paying off: Mandela’s granddaughters have at last secured their very own reality TV series. The as-yet-untitled show from American producer Rick Leed, creator of Dr. 90210 (which documented one man’s brave efforts to end segregation between lips and ass-fat), will follow a trio of younger Mandela women, all of whom were raised in the United States but returned to South Africa to follow their dreams, more or less around the time their grandfather suddenly became president. “The show will be about our lives as young, black women… We’re not wearing ‘I’m a Mandela’ T-shirts,” one of those granddaughters said at a press conference that had gathered because they are Mandelas.

“This is about three women breaking away from the Mandela legacy to find their own feet,” the director added of the show that would see those women pursuing their very independent business pursuits very independently, coincidentally in the exact same country where the Mandela name is the most powerful and revered. But while those business pursuits involve everything from planning to maybe someday set up a Mandela charity focused on housing, education, and medical services, to launching their very own clothing line and working in the “luxury brands business,” the Mandelas insist that they are “definitely not the African Kardashians.” Which is true, at least in the sense that the Kardashians won their reality show thanks to a sex tape, while the Mandelas won theirs as a spoil in the victory against apartheid. Though obviously, in both instances, the black man came out on top. Eh? Eh? I feel horrible.