Just as the Caster Semenya scandal has started to die down, South African sport has been rocked with rumours about Zakumi, the green-haired leopard who is the mascot of next year’s FIFA World Cup. Zakumi made his first personal appearance at the FIFA Final Draw in Cape Town recently, and gender body language expert Dr Shakyah Booti found Zakumi ‘decidedly light in his loafers’ after he appeared on stage opposite Charlize Theron.

Of course, he may simply have been confused by the way Errol Arendz cunningly  disguised Charlize as a red velvet staircase, but even more serious questions have been raised about his identity: is Zakumi actually a leopard?

Species protection activists have pointed out that the hair sprouting all over his head are characteristic of lions. “This is not a colour issue,” said spokesperson of SOP (Save our Species), Precious Mgubane. “Zakumi can wear his or her hair anyway he/she chooses, but if Zakumi is actually a lio-pard of mixed parentage, the public has the right to know. We demand to know what Zakumi actually is before next year’s World Cup.”

Meanwhile, Julius Malema has come out strongly in defence of Zakumi’s “African right to trans-specie-ism” and has challenged Sepp Blatter to undergo tests to prove that he is in fact human.

One Response to “Gender tests for Zakumi?”

1. Gunja Jim says:

   December 23, 2009 at 8:59 pm

   What the effing difference does it make?

   Whatever Zakumi is, he’s from PROC - People’s Republic of China!

   Just like all the other FIFA merchandise in the Engen stores nowdays (except the ones made in Vietnam).