#Ebola: Big Brother Africa denies rejecting contestants from West Africa

Widespread reports suggest that the organisers of Big Brother Africa have planned to drop contestants from Ebola-affected countries from participating in the season 9 of its annual reality show.

The reports insinuated that the four Ghanaians who made it through the selection stage were denied from participating, with fresh audition taking place in Johannesburg for Ghanaian nationals living in South Africa as a precautionary measure.



However, the producers of the reality series have dismissed media reports that contestants from Ghana were rejected because of an Ebola outbreak in their country.

Michelle Esau, Big Brother publicist for South Africa, said the Ghanaians applied for visas to travel to South Africa for the final stage of auditions but their applications were not processed and issued in time.
She said, “The contestants from Ghana could not make it because of delays in their visa applications.
Therefore we had to get Ghanaians within South Africa to audition.”

Big Brother Africa is now in its ninth season, and is set to commence in early September, with shooting expected to hold in Johannesburg.