Hlomla Dandala Shares How He Was Discriminated Against on ‘Isidingo’ Set: “I Was Very Much Alone”

• Hlomla Dandala explained why fellow black actors discriminated against him on the set of Isidingo: The Need
• He shared his experience during an episode of Inside Acting, which premiered on the Inside Story Network YouTube channel on Thursday, 22 January 2026, and featured Dawn Thandeka King
• In a snippet shared on X (Twitter) on Wednesday, 28 January 2026, Hlomla Dandala also shared how the industry often boxed him into language stereotypes that limited his roles

Veteran actor Hlomla Dandala left South Africans with their jaws on the floor when he shared the discrimination he faced on the set of Isidingo: The Need because of his English accent.

The former The River actor previously ruffled feathers when he made serious allegations while exposing the dark side of the entertainment industry.

On Wednesday, 28 January 2026, social media user @Constitution_94 shared a snippet of an episode of Inside Acting featuring Hlomla Dandala and Dawn Thandeka King, who recently returned to Isitha: The Enemy to reprise her role as Queen Nomcebo. The episode premiered on the Inside Story Network YouTube channel on Thursday, 22 January 2026.

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Hlomla Dandala shares how he was discriminated against on ‘Isidingo’ set

In the snippet, Hlomla shared his experience as a multi-linguist in South Africa’s film and movie industry. He suggested that, despite being fluent in several languages, he had found it difficult to land roles.

“In South Africa, if you do one language, you can't speak the other ones. That's the rule. If you do something in English, he doesn’t know anything, and then you go and do something in Zulu, oh, he doesn’t know Xhosa, and then you do it, and I've always been battling that,” Hlomla Dandala said.

The actor who failed to impress Smoke & Mirrors fans also opened up about how he landed the role of Derrick Nyathi on the popular SABC3 show Isidingo: The Need. He shared that he initially auditioned to play Parsons. Instead, I was cast as Derrick Nyathi, a businessman married to a white woman.

During lunch breaks, Hlomla said he was discriminated against by black actors, who called him oyimbo, which basically means coconut because of the way he spoke English.

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“With the guys, yeah, we're working together, but they had this thing, they would call me coconut. I've never spoken about it, actually, and I'm only speaking because you understand the reality of it. But I was very much alone throughout. Very much alone because you know how set lunches are. White folk eat by themselves, black folk eat by themselves, and I was a black folk that couldn't sit with black folk because I spoke English like a white man, and I couldn't quite sit with the white folk cause white folk are doing their thing. So, I spent the bulk of ‘Isidingo’ sitting alone,” Hlomla Dandala revealed.

Watch the full video below:

Hlomla Dandala’s alleged new woman causes a stir online

Meanwhile, Briefly News previously reported that Hlomla Dandala left several netizens in awe as he introduced his alleged new woman.

A picture of the star with an Asian woman caused a stir on social media as it went viral. Many netizens flooded the comment section with their reactions to Dandala dating an Asian woman.

Source: Briefly News