Some South
Africans have been left fuming after Meghan Markle recalled
a fire that broke out in Archie’s room while she was on a
tour in the country.
It is understood that an incident
took place on September 23, 2019, when a heater in the room Archie was meant to
be sleeping in started to smoke.
The Duchess of Sussex’s son –
who was then four months old – was not in the room in Cape Town at
the time, however.
Recalling the incident on
the first episode of her new podcast with Spotify, Meghan told
her friend tennis star Serena Williams that the whole ordeal left her
“shaken” and “in tears”.
She said in the podcast:
“The moment we landed, we had to drop him off at this housing unit that
they had had us staying in.
“He was going to get
ready to go down for his nap.
“We immediately went to
an official engagement in this township called Nyanga, and there was this
moment where I’m standing on a tree stump and I’m giving this speech to women
and girls, and we finish the engagement, we get in the car and they say there’s
been a fire at the residence.”
Despite the upset, Prince
Harry’s wife said she was obliged to continue with her official engagements
there, and accused those running the tour of concentrating on “how it
looks, instead of how it feels”.
Meghan added: “I said:
This doesn’t make any sense. I was like: Can you just tell people what
happened?
“And so much, I think,
optically, the focus ends up being on how it looks instead of how it
feels.”
The criticism has left some
South Africans livid, as many took to social media to hit out at the Duchess.
Not only this, but Meghan’s description of the residence is a ‘housing unit’
has caused upset.
Following this
‘#VoetsekMeghan’ – an offensive term meaning ‘go away’ – even began trending
on Twitter.
One said: “So after the
supposed fire, Meghan could have taken Archie to their engagements in South
Africa. Catherine did it in Australia and New Zealand without issue.
“Why could she not? Do you know why? Because then it would no longer be just about her!
#VoetsekMeghan.”
While another wrote: “I
don’t care about the fire incident but the statement: coming to South Africa
was the bravest thing she has done. Speaks volumes.
“As if she was coming to
some apocalypse state or something. She should elaborate on what was brave
about it, is it because is in Africa? #VoetsekMeghan.”
