Have you ever peeped through the curtains in an effort to get a better look at your neighbours new boyfriend or girlfriend as they try to leave unnoticed to do their walk of shame?
The walk of shame has many definitions, but here I mean when a person sneaks out of their lover’s (or even more relevant for my purposes in this column), their paramour’s house still dressed in last night’s glad rags which are far too glamourous for day wear. As they sneak away trying desperately to look and act normal, they end up standing out like a goat rib in a chicken samosa.
Frankly as one who will freely admit having been curious about other people’s business pretty much all my life, I won’t judge you either way.
I got thinking about this prurience or excessive interest in the sexual activity of others as I thought of the many office Christmas parties or year-end company parties that have been underway around the world for the past few weeks and all the sexual shenanigans that erupt at these gatherings.
As I was thinking about these hook ups, the news media around me was buzzing with echoes of Bill Clinton back in January 1998 when he, as CBS News wrote on their website 15 years later, “took to the microphone, finger wagging, face red, and issued a denial that he would soon come to regret.
"I want to say one thing to the American people. I want you to listen to me. I'm going to say this again: I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky."
Here in South Africa as Kenyans were celebrating the success of the Rugby Sevens team in Cape Town over hosts South Africa and on Jamhuri Day to boot, President Jacob Zuma was denying rumours he had an affair with the chairwoman of South African Airways amid media speculation the relationship had led to that week’s surprise sacking of Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene.
The minister had rebuked Dudu Myeni, chairwoman of the state-owned airline as well as of Zuma's charitable trust, the Jacob Zuma Foundation, for mismanaging a $62.98 million deal with Airbus.
A statement issued by the Presidency said: "Her (Myeni’s) relationship with the President is purely professional. Rumours about a romance and a child are baseless and are designed to cast aspersions on the President."
Clearly denials of hook-ups between the powerful and influential are a big thing around the continent.
Just a few weeks ago Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta was reported to have “clarified” (interesting word choice) that the now former Devolution Cabinet Secretary Anne Waiguru was neither a wife nor a girlfriend of his.
Uhuru said he has one wife and people should not force another one on him.
This in turn sounded to my ears at least very much like an eerie echo from 2009 when president, Mwai Kibaki said at a rare press conference, "The media have been reporting that I have another wife or wives, I have only one wife." The president threatened to sue anybody repeating allegations that he had two wives, saying the claims had put him in a "foul mood".
In 2006 the Ugandan opposition politician Kizza Besigye had told a journalist that he knew about an affair which his erstwhile friend and comrade in arms, the Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni once had with his wife Winnie Byanyima, but said that this had not been the cause of the two men's political rivalry.
For me the interesting thing about all these affairs and alleged affairs is the fact that they are now being reported in the national newspapers of the countries in question.
Two decades ago, in Kenya for instance, even if you knew for a fact and had evidence to back it up that the president or even a cabinet minister was having an affair, it would never have seen light of day - but the journalist reporting it might have seen the inside of a prison or torture cell or worse.
That said, I wonder if the office sexual shenanigans ever reach the pages of the internal newsletter. Now that would be a scandal sheet worth the name, especially in some firms.
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