Onezwa Mbola accuses Nara Smith of ‘stealing’ her food content

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South African content creator Onezwa Mbola, founder of artisanal condiment brand EMandulo, has accused TikTok influencer Nara Smith of “stealing” her culinary content. Smith, who has 8 million followers on the platform, reportedly responded by threatening legal action against Mbola following his accusations.

The controversy began on June 14 with Mbola’s now-deleted TikTok video in which she accused Smith of recreating her delicious cooking content.

“For four months now, I’ve seen a very, very popular content creator use my ideas, and again, I’m not the first person to do anything. They continually used my ideas to get opinions,” Mbola told her fans. “Now that would be fine, except in South Africa we don’t get paid for views, and where she is they are paid for views, so she makes money by stealing my content.”

Mbola alleged that Nara copied his boba tea video.

The chef did not explicitly mention Smith by name, but Mbola claimed that Smith’s June 12 video featuring boba tea closely mirrored his recipe video posted two days earlier, on June 10. Mbola’s version featured a unique twist on the popular drink, incorporating guava leaf tea, guava-infused goat’s milk, and a savory mushroom and spinach pancake. Smith created a traditional version of the drink.

“I was so, very, very, very proud of this video. I tweeted about it, I was so excited and then a day later she made a boba video and you could say maybe it’s a coincidence,” explained Mbola, who has over 600,000 subscribers on TikTok. “It would be nice if it was a coincidence, except that it’s a coincidence that happens very often, so is it really a coincidence?”

Mbola said she felt “disheartened” that Smith was using her content to earn “thousands of dollars in views” when she is lucky to get a brand collaboration “every three months” .

To compound the problem, the South African chef revealed that her cooking style had been constantly compared to Nara’s on the platform. Onezwa expressed frustration at being referred to as a “South African Nara Smith”, feeling angered by the comparison. She asked herself, “How can I be a version of her when she’s stealing my content?” »

Nara allegedly threatened to take Mbola to court.

Smith has not made a public statement about Mbola’s allegations. Instead, she allegedly sent an email to the South African businesswoman, asking her to retract her statement.

According to a screenshot of the email shared on Mbola’s Page is false and damages my reputation. »

She continued: “These allegations are completely false. The videos in question are not my original creations, and I have all the necessary proof on the social media platform TikTok. Your false allegations have caused significant damage to my personal and professional reputation.

The TikTok star said that if Mbola did not retract, she would take legal action against her for “defamation”.

Mbola’s video was deleted, but she doubled down on her accusations against Smith in a follow-up TikTok video posted on June 16. In this video, she proudly defended herself and other “small content creators” that Smith allegedly stole from. Since.

“I don’t mince words. If I said it, believe me, I will stand by it,” she added.

Mbola hasn’t spoken much about the drama lately, but she took to TikTok on June 20 to reveal her brand new paid partnership with TakeAlot.com, a major online shopping platform in South Africa.

What do you think? Was Smith copying Mbola?


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