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Joanne Joseph

Joanne Joseph

KEYNOTE SPEAKER

MC

JOURNALIST

AUTHOR

RADIO HOST

TV PRESENTER

Non-exclusive

Who Is Joanne Joseph

Joanne is a established South Africa media personality having spent 20 years in the media industry, including a number of years hosting prominent TV news shows on eNCA and the SABC. Joanne will host the Afternoon Drive show.

Durban-born Joanne Joseph is a familiar face to South African viewers, having presented television news for the past fifteen years. In her current role as afternoon news anchor on 24-hour news channel, eNCA, Joanne interviews many high-profile individuals and brings viewers regular updates on national and international stories and breaking news. She is most passionate about finding the human angle that moves beyond the facts and figures of a story and finds the extraordinary stories of ordinary women intriguing. Joanne has a Master’s degree in literature from Wits University. This is her first book.

Joanne’s broadcast career started in radio and she has extensive experience on the airwaves. Joanne has presented several high-profile live broadcasts including the live coverage of Nelson Mandela’s passing broadcast internationally, Thabo Mbeki’s presidential inauguration, Walter Sisulu and Beyers Naudé funerals. She regularly MCs corporate functions in English and French and has produced documentaries for the United Nations Development Programme among others. She has also authored a best-selling book, Drug Muled, Sixteen Years in a Thai Prison; teaches scriptwriting for broadcast and is a sought-after MC.

Joanne has also used her media platform to raise awareness for causes close to her heart, including engaging the Minister of Justice to prioritise abuse cases and expedite interventions that safeguard society's most vulnerable.

Experience

Current

2018 - 2020

2009 - 2018

1998 - 2009

Owner of Joanne Joseph Productions and Promotions

Radio Presenter at Radio 702

News Anchor at eNews Channel

Bulletin writer and presenter at SABC News

Book

Drug Muled – Sixteen Years in a Thai Prison
Children of Sugarcane

Drug Muled – Sixteen Years in a Thai Prison

On the verge of a big break in modelling, Miss SA finalist, 21-year-old Vanessa Goosen is caught up in every traveller’s nightmare. Duped into carrying books with 1.7 kilograms of heroin hidden in them, Goosen is arrested and tried on drug trafficking charges.

Vanessa Goosen, Drug Muled It’s 1994. South Africa is on the brink of freedom. On the verge of a big break in modelling, Miss SA finalist, 21-year-old Vanessa Goosen is caught up in every traveller’s nightmare. Duped into carrying books with 1.7 kilograms of heroin hidden in them, Goosen is arrested and tried on drug trafficking charges. Deaf to her pleas of innocence, the Thai courts sentence Goosen to death. On appeal her sentence is commuted to life, to be served in Bangkok’s notorious Lard Yao prison.

 

Pregnant, terrified and desperately alone, Goosen begins a harrowing 16-year journey behind bars. Forced to part with her beloved daughter three years later, Goosen’s story traces the joy and hurt of motherhood behind bars, the depression that comes with long-term incarceration and separation, and her return to a hugely changed South Africa in 2010.

Children of Sugarcane

Vividly set against the backdrop of 19th century India and the British-owned sugarcane plantations of Natal, written with great tenderness and lyricism, Children of Sugarcane paints an intimate and wrenching picture of indenture told from a woman’s perspective.

Shanti, a bright teenager stifled by life in rural India and facing an arranged marriage, dreams that South Africa is an opportunity to start afresh. The Colony of Natal is where Shanti believes she can escape the poverty, caste, and troubling fate of young girls in her village.

Months later, after a harrowing sea voyage, she arrives in Natal only to discover the profound hardship and slave labour that await her.

Spanning four decades and two continents, Children of Sugarcane demonstrates the lifegiving power of love, heartache, and the indestructible bonds between family and friends. These bonds prompt heroism and sacrifice, the final act of which leads to Shanti's redemption.

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