For many, the month of January can be a nightmare with bills piling up. Renowned actress Londiwe Nene is feeling the brunt of the new year after the production company failed to pay the balance of her salary for the Mzansi Magic show, Aunties. She played the role of Rachel Ndlovu on the show Aunties where she shot with Pula Bakgaga Media for five days. Still, a fairly new actress who has had roles in Youngins and Adulting, Londiwe never expected at such an early stage in her career to be affected by salary issues.
NOT PAID
"Pula Bakgaga Media cast me for the role of Rachel. I did the audition and screen reading and they loved me. I negotiated my rate of R40000 directly with the production and not my agent. We agreed that would be my fee for five days of shooting,' she said. Londiwe then received a call to say there had been an issue with her rate. "They made a mistake and gave me the wrong shooting times and needed to lower the rate. I was informed of this after the shoot was complete. So, there was a back and forth regarding the rate and I asked them not to air the show until we reached an agreement.' Days before the show aired, she and the production company reached an agreement of R30,000. "They paid me R20 000 because they did not want to have issues on the day of the premiere.' However, Londiwe said she has been waiting for her balance since May last year. "I am being given excuses."
COMMUNICATION
ZiMoja has seen communication between production manager Kamogelo Van Wyk, Pula Bakgaga, Nqobile Sithole and Londiwe regarding the matter. In the discussion, Kamogelo committed to paying R30,000. "We will compensate you with R30k as requested, but we will have a payment plan as we can pay you the R20k and then the R10k after the project. As I mentioned before, the company has no money," Kamogelo's text read. Londiwe told ZiMoja she has exhausted all efforts to try and get her payment. "I did not want to expose them, but I had to.' Pula Bakgaga Media had not responded to our messages for a comment on the matter.
