No matter how stressed we are about the world, South Africans will always find a way to insert a well-placed joke into the conversation — a trait that has also become a defining feature of the country's media.
Take Helen Zille's recent mayoral campaign in Johannesburg. Her viral stunts, from snorkeling in potholes to rowing in flooded streets, have been widely covered by outlets like Netwerk24 and Daily Maverick. Many have dubbed this the "Gogo effect", where featured issues are reportedly addressed soon after Zille has posted about it on her social media.
While her actions read as humorous, or even absurd at times, they actually point to something more deliberate in the media. By highlighting infrastructure failures through her viral stunts, Zille is making the DA's 'Believe in Joburg' campaign immediately accessible and keeping it familiar.
The campaign works because it has made people feel seen and heard. All South Africans know how it feels to hit a pothole just after replacing tyres damaged by the last one, just as ongoing water maintenance issues remain a well-known reality in Johannesburg. These are Johannesburgers' lived experiences.
So, instead of directly asking for people's time and attention (to essentially garner votes), the campaign draws them in more subtly. They have a moment of being on the receiving end — of the joke, of the recognition, of the shared experience of frustration — and that familiarity and form of connection creates a kind of buy-in before any formal political ask is made. Here, humour is not just to entertain, it is utilised to position a message.
Via Facebook
Similarly, this dynamic is also evident in advertising. April began with anxiety over fuel price increases, and with another hike expected in May, the economic pressure facing South Africans remains largely unchanged.
While many South Africans are reassessing their budgets, WeBuyCars steps in with its own tongue-in-cheek take on a solution. Their latest advertisement, 'When the Fuel Price Pushes You to Sell', leans directly into this tension concerning rising fuel costs, using humour to frame a marketing response within that reality.
This approach is consistent with the brand's broader creative strategy, which has been recognised for its locally grounded and digital-first content — even earning a YouTube Creative Visionary award in 2025.
Via YouTube
This golden thread of humour in South African media is captured well by movie reviewer, Thabiso Moloi, reflecting on the final film of local comedy legend Leon Schuster, Mr. Bones 3: Son of Bones:
"Heading into the cinema I had my 'reviewer' hat on ready to analyse various sequences but after a few minutes into the movie, I realised that's not the point and instead the entire thing around it is to just relax, laugh, and escape for an hour and a couple of minutes."
South Africans are more than aware of their challenges, they live it every day. What media offers, then, is a brief shift in perspective: a moment of release that sits alongside reality.
The media that stands out (and earns recognition for it) is the media that understands its audience well enough to reflect that balance — it's the media that speaks its audience's language, sometimes quite literally, and often with a punchline.
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Want to learn more about the art of humour in South Africa and why it works for some brands, but not for others? Read Gautrains PR Approach: Why It Worked.
*Image courtesy of Canva
Information sourced from TWFLD, BizCommunity and APNews