Survivor South Africa: Maldives

Survivor South Africa: Maldives
Season Information
Version	South Africa
Season No.	4
Filming Location	Addu Atoll, Maldives
Filming Dates	October 2010
Season Run	February 24, 2011 - May 26, 2011
No. of Episodes	14
No. of Days	27
No. of Castaways	19
Winner	Hykie Berg
Runner(s)-Up	Letshego Moshoeu
Tribes	Goma Raituhn Eku
Prize for Winner	R1,000,000
Opening Sequence
Season Chronology
Previous	Santa Carolina
Next	Champions

Survivor South Africa: Maldives is the fourth season of Survivor South Africa.

Maldives featured 19 new contestants who began the game divided into two informal groups, the "Celebs" and the "Plebs". Through an unusual tribe division process, the Goma and Raituhn tribes were formed on Day 4 and came to define the rest of the season's politics. The twist-heavy season introduced the modern Hidden Immunity Idol to Survivor South Africa as well as the Black and White Cowries, all of which contributed significantly to the season's active strategy. After 27 days of intense gameplay combined with numerous heated arguments, both of a strategic and personal nature, "Celeb" Hykie Berg defeated "Pleb" Letshego Moshoeu in an 8-3 jury vote to become the first male Ultimate Survivor of the series.

Following the airing of Maldives, the Survivor South Africa series entered its second hiatus until its resumption with Champions in 2014.

To date, Maldives has produced one returning player (Tejan Pillay) for a future season.

Production

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Twists/Changes

• Odd-Numbered Cast: The game began with nineteen contestants.
• "Celebs" vs. "Plebs": The cast comprised of nine well-known South African celebrities, referred to as "Celebs", and ten regular South African citizens, referred to as "Plebs".
• Separated Maroonings: The groups of "Celebs" and "Plebs" were marooned without any knowledge of each other's existence. They would be united on Day 4.
• Tribe Division: The nine "Celebs" were divided into two teams of four at the first Reward Challenge, with one member drawing the odd black buff and being left without a team. Separately, the "Plebs" were divided into two teams of five at the first Immunity Challenge. The losing team of "Plebs" attended Tribal Council on Day 3 and voted out one member. At the union of the groups, the like-colored team members joined to become Goma and Raituhn. The person with the black buff joined the tribe whose "Plebs" lost the first Immunity Challenge.
• First Impressions: Following the first Reward Challenge as new tribes, Goma and Raituhn each voted for the castaway they believed best fit the description of being the "least cut out to be in the game of Survivor".
• Black Cowrie Shell: The two castaways who received the most votes at the First Impressions twist received a Black Cowrie shell bracelet. The person holding the Black Cowrie at Tribal Council would automatically have one vote against them. The only way that they could prevent that from happening would be to defect to the opposing tribe at the beginning of an Immunity Challenge. Regardless of whether they mutinied, if the person holding the Black Cowrie was voted out, they would pass the curse on to one of their tribemates. The twist ended at the merge.
• Hidden Immunity Idol: One Hidden Immunity Idol was hidden at each camp. As opposed to the two previous seasons where the idol was played before the votes are cast, this idol is to be played after the votes are cast, but before the votes are read.
• Double Tribal Council: On Day 15, both tribes were instructed to vote out one member.
• Merge: On Day 16, the tribes merged with nine members remaining.
• White Cowrie Shell: The White Cowrie Shell was introduced into the game at the start of the merge. The holder of the White Cowrie can choose to negate a vote cast against someone else in the tribe when they vote. The person who is "blessed" by the White Cowrie would become its next holder.
• Final Tribal Council Format: The Final Two faced a jury of ten.
  • Public Vote: After the airing of the penultimate episode, the public would vote for their favorite finalist. The finalist who receives more votes from the public would receive an extra vote at the Final Tribal Council.

Castaways

Contestant		Tribe Affiliation			Finish	Votes Against
		Pre-Tribes	Original Tribe	Merged Tribe
	Lukhanyo Nontshinga 27, Kimberley, NC Pro Rugby Player	Plebs			1st Voted Out Day 3	3
	Philicity Reeken 30, Johannesburg, GP Actress	Celebs	Goma		2nd Voted Out Day 5	5
	Tshepo Maseko 36, Johannesburg, GP Actor	Celebs	Raituhn		3rd Voted Out Day 7	5
	Tasleem Vally 25, Durban, KZN Make-Up Artist	Plebs	Raituhn		4th Voted Out Day 9	9
	Carmel Fisher 29, Johannesburg, GP Actress	Celebs	Raituhn		5th Voted Out Day 11	4
	Jacques Terre'Blanche 28, Johannesburg, GP Musician	Celebs	Goma		Quit Day 12	2
	Sindi Lukhele 25, Johannesburg, GP Events Coordinator	Plebs	Goma		6th Voted Out Day 14	2
	Vanessa Haywood 33, Cape Town, WC Actress	Celebs	Goma		Evacuated 1st Jury Member Day 15	5
	Roxy Burger 24, Johannesburg, GP Presenter	Celebs	Goma		7th Voted Out 2nd Jury Member Day 15	6
	Harry Wiggins 27, Worcester, WC Maths Lecturer	Plebs	Raituhn		8th Voted Out 3rd Jury Member Day 15	11
	Simon Coetzer 40, Johannesburg, GP HR Consultant	Plebs	Goma	Eku	9th Voted Out 4th Jury Member Day 17	5
	Malusi Mbambo 30, Durban, KZN Business Development Consultant	Plebs	Raituhn		10th Voted Out 5th Jury Member Day 19	5
	Tejan Pillay 32, Durban, KZN Engineer	Plebs	Raituhn		11th Voted Out 6th Jury Member Day 21	8
	Sean September 40, Cape Town, WC Lawyer	Plebs	Goma		12th Voted Out 7th Jury Member Day 23	5
	Alison de Chazal 53, Durban, KZN Mother	Plebs	Goma		13th Voted Out 8th Jury Member Day 25	6
	MXO Lokwe 31, Johannesburg, GP Musician	Celebs	Goma		14th Voted Out 9th Jury Member Day 26	5
	Bonnie Henna 31, Cape Town, WC Actress	Celebs	Raituhn		15th Voted Out 10th Jury Member Day 27	6
	Letshego Moshoeu 27, Johannesburg, GP Biokeniticist	Plebs	Raituhn		Runner-Up	4
	Hykie Berg 32, Johannesburg, GP Actor	Celebs	Raituhn		Ultimate Survivor	7

Season Summary

This season's cast consisted of nineteen castaways, consisting of ten regular South Africans (referred to as "plebs") and 9 celebrities (referred to as "celebs"). Initially separated on two different islands based on their status, each group was unaware of the other group's existence. Both groups were randomly into two teams, simply referred to as "blue" and "yellow"), that would later become the official tribes of Goma and Raituhn respective. Due to an odd number of "celebs", one castaway (Philicity Reeken) drew a black sandbag and not be part of either team. The "celebs" competed in a Reward Challenge and were not subjected to a Tribal Council. After the "plebs" on the blue team lost the first Immunity Challenge and voted out Lukhanyo Nontshinga, the 18 remaining castaways formed the Goma tribe (composed of both blue teams) and Raituhn tribe (composed of both yellow teams) and competed in their next Reward Challenge. Each tribe then voted for the castaway they believed was "least cut out to be in the game of Survivor" - Alison de Chazal on Goma and Tasleem Vally on Raituhn received the most votes, and they both received a Black Cowrie shell, which added a vote against them at each Tribal Council before the merge until they either decided to defect to the other tribe before an Immunity Challenge or were voted out.

After the unification, the "celebs" on Raituhn were initially down in numbers due to a clear divide where the "plebs" consistently outnumbered them. On Goma, both Roxy Burger and Philicity Reeken were targeted as they were considered to be weak physical links, and Jacques Terre'Blanche was targeted due to a perceived lack of will to stay in the game. After Raituhn won immunity, the "celebs" on Goma ultimately joined forces with Sean September in order to vote out Philicity in a plurality, as she was also unable to bond with some of her tribemates. Raituhn remained largely split into "celebs" and "plebs", with Tshepo Maseko being voted out after these "plebs" maintained their majority alliance.

After a second Immunity Challenge loss, the "plebs" and "celebs" joined forces to vote out Tasleem as she was perceived to be the weakest physical link on the tribe. She passed her Black Cowrie shell to Bonnie Henna as she was also considered to be physically weak. Raituhn then lost their third Immunity Challenge in a row, and the "plebs" re-established their majority in order to vote out Carmel Fisher, which particularly angered Hykie Berg, who grew especially fond of Carmel and was growing sick of Harry Wiggins, who was perceived to be overly scheming.

Shortly after Carmel was voted out, Jacques announced he wanted to quit as he was becoming unable to handle the harsh conditions of the game - namely the lack of food and suffering more harshly from the effects of his vitiligo than normally. After winning the next Reward Challenge in a duel, Jacques quit prior to starting the next Immunity Challenge. Goma subsequently lost the next Immunity Challenge, and the "plebs" had established a clear majority after MXO Lokwe flipped to their alliance. This led to the closely aligned Roxy Burger and Vanessa Haywood falling into the minority. However, Vanessa discovered a clue to the location of the Hidden Immunity Idol and later found it in the shallow waters of the beach. Roxy would later successfully play this idol on Vanessa and allowing the pair to blindside Sindi Lukhele uncontested.

Prior to the Day 15 Reward Challenge, it was announced that a Double Tribal Council would occur that evening. During the challenge, whilst competing against Bonnie Henna, Vanessa suffered an injury to her neck and was evacuated from the game. The challenge would continue, with Goma losing once again. Now without any alliances, Roxy found herself on the chopping block. Despite campaigning for MXO's elimination by calling him out for being a wildcard, Roxy received votes from all of her tribemates, eliminating her without much contention. On Raituhn, Bonnie, despite being closely aligned with Hykie (who was campaigning for Harry to be voted out) had grown suspicious of Malusi Mbambo and found his perceived unpredictable gameplay to be threatening as the merge was approaching. Harry continued to target Hykie for being a threat. Ultimately, Harry received votes from all of his tribemates besides Bonnie, eliminating him.

At the merge feast, Bonnie found the White Cowrie shell, which gave her the power to nullify a single vote at any Tribal Council whilst casting her vote. Raituhn had entered the merge in a narrow 5-4 majority as a partial consequence of the unexpected exits of Jacques and Vanessa. Votes initially remained on old tribal lines, and all the former Raituhn members voted out Goma's leader, Simon Coetzer. Following Bonnie's continued campaign for his elimination, Malusi ended up receiving votes from all of his former Raituhn tribemates, but none from the former Goma members. As Malusi and the old former Goma members voted sporadically, Malusi was blindsided in a 4-2-1-1 plurality vote.

Following several heated arguments back at camp and at Tribal Council, between Hykie and Tejan Pillay over morality and deception in the game, old tribal alliances collapsed. Bonnie and Hykie turned on their former Raituhn tribe members Tejan and Letshego Moshoeu by extensively campaigning for Tejan's elimination due to his apparent repeated lying, whereas Tejan responded by saying Hykie was acting similarly and was much more of a threat in the game. Ultimately, Tejan was voted out in a 4-0 vote as a Hidden Immunity Idol was played to save Hykie, though Tejan received the majority of the votes and would have been voted out regardless.

At the final six, Bonnie and Hykie won back the allegiance of Letshego, re-establishing old alliances of former Goma and former Raituhn members. After not being picked to go on the reward due to being in the opposite alliance, the three former Raituhn members were each given a satchel containing food back at camp, with Letshego picking a bag that concealed a Hidden Immunity Idol. She decided to share this information with Bonnie and Hykie. After Hykie won the Immunity Challenge, the Raituhn members guaranteed their safety by using the Immunity Necklace, the White Cowrie shell and the Hidden Immunity Idol within their alliance. Hykie gave up immunity to Bonnie, allowing Bonnie to play the White Cowrie shell on Hykie, and Letshego played her Hidden Immunity Idol on herself, negating all three votes from the former Goma members. This allowed Bonnie, Hykie and Letshego to vote out Sean, who was considered to be the biggest physical challenge threat on Goma.

This left Alison and MXO in the minority, and both desperately tried to convince Letshego to flip to their alliance, believing that Bonnie and Hykie were so tightly-aligned that they would take each other to the Final Two should Letshego stick with her alliance and lose the Final Immunity Challenge. This seemingly angered both Bonnie and Hykie, with Bonnie in particular expressing significant disdain for both the former Goma members. After winning a third Individual Immunity Challenge, Letshego decided to stick with her Raituhn alliance to vote out Alison, as she seemed to earn significant ire from Bonnie, despite her being less of an Immunity Challenge threat. This left MXO without any allies. Without any other strategies, MXO joked about pretending to have found a Hidden Immunity Idol in the next boat mail and tried to convince Letshego to vote with him. After he refused to show Letshego the "idol" hidden in his shirt pocket, she reassured Bonnie and Hykie that idols were no longer in play and all thought MXO was stroking his ego. In the second part of the final four Immunity Challenge, MXO narrowly lost out to Bonnie in a race to make fire and light a torch, to the cheers of Hykie and Letshego. MXO criticised the trio for ostracising him, reminding him of his negative experiences in school about not fitting in. Despite host Nico Panagio challenging the trio's allegiances and treatment of MXO, as well as the latter's campaigning, the last remaining former Goma member's fate was all but sealed by this Immunity Challenge loss, and he was voted out 3-1.

After a shock Final Immunity Challenge win by Letshego, she voted out Bonnie as she was forced to break up their alliance. At the Final Tribal Council, the jury criticized both Letshego's and Hykie's poor social games as well as failing to answer some of their questions, but most felt that Hykie's cutthroat strategic game while being tightly-aligned with Bonnie was more deserving than Letshego's under-the-radar game. During the finale, the public's jury vote was revealed first, and was awarded to Hykie. In the end, Hykie defeated Letshego in an 8-3 vote and became the Ultimate Survivor.

Episode	Air date	Challenges		Cowrie Shell	Eliminated (Vote)	Finish
		Reward	Immunity
1	February 24, 2011	Jacques, MXO, Roxy, Vanessa	Celebs1		Lukhanyo (3-2)	1st Voted Out Day 3
			Harry, Letshego, Malusi, Tasleem, Tejan
2	March 3, 2011	Raituhn	Raituhn	Alison	Philicity (5-2-2-1)	2nd Voted Out Day 5
				Tasleem
3	March 10, 2011	Raituhn	Goma	Alison	Tshepo (5-4-1)	3rd Voted Out Day 7
				Tasleem
4	March 17, 2011	Goma	Goma	Alison	Tasleem (8-1)	4th Voted Out Day 9
				Tasleem
5	March 24, 2011	Raituhn	Goma	Alison	Carmel (4-3-1)	5th Voted Out Day 11
				Bonnie
6	March 31, 2011	Raituhn	Raituhn	Alison	Jacques (no vote)	Quit Day 12
				Bonnie	Sindi (2-1-0)2	6th Voted Out Day 14
7	April 7, 2011	Raituhn	None	Alison	Vanessa (no vote)	Evacuated 1st Jury Member Day 15
					Roxy (4-1-1)	7th Voted Out 2nd Jury Member Day 15
				Bonnie	Harry (4-1-1-1)3	8th Voted Out 3rd Jury Member Day 15
8	April 14, 2011	Goma	Letshego	Bonnie	Simon (5-4)	9th Voted Out 4th Jury Member Day 17
9	April 21, 2011	Tejan [Bonnie, Hykie]	Sean		Malusi (4-2-1-1)4	10th Voted Out 5th Jury Member Day 19
10	April 28, 2011	Survivor Auction	Sean	Hykie	Tejan (4-0)2,4	11th Voted Out 6th Jury Member Day 21
11	May 5, 2011	Sean [Alison, MXO]	Hykie (Bonnie)5	Bonnie	Sean (3-0)2,4	12th Voted Out 7th Jury Member Day 23
12	May 12, 2011	Hykie [Letshego]	Letshego	Hykie	Alison (3-2)	13th Voted Out 8th Jury Member Day 25
13	May 19, 2011	None	Bonnie		MXO (3-1)	14th Voted Out 9th Jury Member Day 26
			Letshego		Bonnie (1-0)	15th Voted Out 10th Jury Member Day 27
14	May 26, 2011	Jury Vote			Letshego (8-3)	Runner-Up
					Hykie (8-3)	Ultimate Survivor
Notes: ^1 The "Celebs" did not compete in the Immunity Challenge and did not attend Tribal Council. ^2 A Hidden Immunity Idol was played, negating all votes against its user. ^3 A Hidden Immunity Idol was played; however, no votes were cast against its user. ^4 The White Cowrie was played; however, no votes were cast against its recipient. ^5 Hykie gave up immunity to Bonnie at Tribal Council.

Voting History

		Pre-Tribes	Original Tribes									Merged Tribe
Episode		1	2	3	4	5	6		7			8	9	10	11	12	13		14
Voted Out		Lukhanyo	Philicity	Tshepo	Tasleem	Carmel	Jacques	Sindi	Vanessa	Roxy	Harry	Simon	Malusi	Tejan	Sean	Alison	MXO	Bonnie	Letshego	Hykie
Vote		3-21,2	5-2-2-1	5-4-1	8-1	4-3-1	No vote3	2-1-04	No vote5	4-1-1	4-1-1-16	5-4	4-2-1-17	4-04,7	3-04,7	3-2	3-1	1-08	8-3
►	Hykie	—	—	Harry	Tasleem	Harry	—	—	—	—	Harry	Simon	Malusi	Tejan	Sean	Alison	MXO	None	Jury Vote
►	Letshego	—	—	Tshepo	Tasleem	Carmel	—	—	—	—	Harry	Simon	Malusi	Hykie	Sean	Alison	MXO	Bonnie
►	Bonnie	—	—	Harry	Tasleem	Harry	—	—	—	—	Malusi	Simon	Malusi	Tejan	Sean	Alison	MXO	None		Hykie
►	MXO	—	Philicity	—	—	—	—	Vanessa	—	Roxy	—	Tejan	Letshego	Tejan	Letshego	Hykie	Hykie			Hykie
►	Alison	Lukhanyo	Jacques	—	—	—	—	Vanessa	—	Roxy	—	Tejan	Bonnie	Hykie	Letshego	Hykie			Letshego
►	Sean	Lukhanyo	Philicity	—	—	—	—	Vanessa	—	Roxy	—	Tejan	Bonnie	Tejan	Letshego					Hykie
►	Tejan	—	—	Tshepo	Tasleem	Carmel	—	—	—	—	Harry	Simon	Malusi	Hykie						Hykie
►	Malusi	—	—	Tshepo	Tasleem	Carmel	—	—	—	—	Harry	Simon	MXO						Letshego
►	Simon	Lukhanyo	Jacques	—	—	—	—	Vanessa	—	Roxy	—	Tejan							Letshego
►	Harry	—	—	Tshepo	Tasleem	Carmel	—	—	—	—	Hykie									Hykie
►	Roxy	—	Philicity	—	—	—	—	Sindi	—	MXO										Hykie
►	Vanessa	—	Philicity	—	—	—	—	Sindi	Evacuated											Hykie
►	Sindi	Sean	Roxy	—	—	—	—	Vanessa
►	Jacques	—	Philicity	—	—	—	Quit
►	Carmel	—	—	Harry	Tasleem	Harry
►	Tasleem	—	—	Tshepo	Bonnie
►	Tshepo	—	—	Harry
►	Philicity	—	Roxy
►	Lukhanyo	Sean
Public vote9																				Hykie
Black Cowrie			Alison	Tasleem	Tasleem	Bonnie		Alison		Alison	Bonnie
Notes: ^1 Due to the odd number of players when the Celebs were divided, Philicity, the odd person out, was left without a tribe. When the tribes were formed on Day 4, she replaced Lukhanyo, evening the tribes at nine members each. ^2 The Celebs did not participate in the Immunity Challenge and so were not eligible for elimination. ^3 Jacques elected to quit the game. No vote occurred for his removal. ^4 A Hidden Immunity Idol was played, negating all votes against its user. ^5 Vanessa was evacuated from the game due to a neck injury. No vote occurred for her removal. ^6 A Hidden Immunity Idol was played; however, no votes were cast against its user. ^7 The White Cowrie was played; however, no votes were cast against its recipient. ^8 Bonnie and Hykie did not vote as they could only vote for each other. By virtue of winning the Final Immunity Challenge, only Letshego voted. ^9 By virtue of winning the public vote, Hykie received one extra jury vote to win.

Trivia

• Maldives is the first season of Survivor South Africa to feature an odd number of castaways.
  • As a result, Maldives is the second season of Survivor South Africa to have an uneven gender divide, after Santa Carolina. This season featured 9 women compared to 10 men.
• The intro for the season premiere of Maldives divides the castaways by "Celebs" and "Plebs", with the names of the "Celebs" being labelled in blue (corresponding to Goma, whose name translates to "famous") and the "Plebs" being labelled in yellow (corresponding to Raituhn, whose name translates to "common man").
• Maldives is the first season in any English-language version of Survivor to have three people eliminated on the same day.
• Maldives is the first season of Survivor South Africa to not feature a tribe switch.
• Maldives is the first season of Survivor South Africa to have the jury phase begin before the merge.
• At the time, Maldives set the franchise record for the largest jury, with 10 jurors.
• Maldives is the first season of Survivor South Africa where every contestant received elimination votes.
• Maldives is the first season of Survivor South Africa to have a male winner.
• Maldives is the earliest season of Survivor South Africa to produce a returning player.
• Maldives is the first season of Survivor South Africa to feature multiple versions of the intro titles.