Reports in an Afrikaans tabloid of telephonic threats made to Idols winner Sasha-Lee Davids and her family have been dismissed as “scandalous”.

The paper suggested Davids and her family were living in fear of their lives after disturbing phone calls made to her home in Atlantis, near Cape Town, since Friday’s announcement by M-Net, the producers of the reality show, that she was not the outright winner.

The announcement followed the controversy over late cellphone votes botched in the outcome of the talent show.

Davids was crowned the winner, but auditors on Friday found that runner-up Jason Hartman, of KwaZulu-Natal, had received 200 000 more votes.

Hartman received 1,3 million votes, compared with Davids’s 1,1 million. M-Net then decided to crown both Davids and Hartman as winners of this year’s show.

Mynie Grové, music producer and spokesperson for the Davids family, on Monday said the family had received no threats on their lives other than “a few ugly phone calls” from Hartman fans.

“It (the tabloid article) is scandalous. No one’s in any danger and the calls were not life-threatening,” Grové said.

She said the family were entitled to their privacy and the phone calls bordered on harassment.

Fremantle, the international company owning the rights to Idols, has given its full support to M-Net for declaring both Sasha-Lee Davids and Jason Hartman as the winners of this year’s season.

Fremantle admitted from Britain that this was the biggest Idols scandal yet. There had in the past been some problems with the SMS system in Britain and France, but it had never happened before that the final result was affected.

Theo Erasmus, the head of entertainment at M-Net, said their decision to announce Jason as an additional winner, even though he had beaten Sasha-Lee by more than 200 000 votes, was in the interest of fairness towards Sasha-Lee.

FINALLY Mara, my absolute favourite [like here] had something good / intellectual to say when she called for Sasha-Lee Davids to do the honourable thing and hand the title over to Jason Hartman. Nice one my baayybeeeee.

She said:

“It wasn’t Sasha-Lee’s fault, but she mustn’t be selfish now. Jason is the winner and finish.”

Mara said she could understand that Sasha-Lee was terribly traumatised by hearing she was the winner and being told a week later that she had not really won.

Randall Abrahams disagreed and said Sasha-Lee shouldn’t be punished for something that wasn’t her fault.

Gareth Cliff said the whole affair was “completely unacceptable and a huge embarrassment”, blaming cellphone networks.

Dave Thompson, of course, has already fucked off. [here]

Jason Hartman and Sasha Lee Davids have been declared joint winners of the Idols television talent search competition.

Both winners will win a Sony BMG recording contract, both will receive a Citroen car and all other prizes will be equally “split”.

Patricia Scholtemeyer, M-Net CEO, said:

“When M-Net realised that not all the SMS votes cast before the cut-off time at 18.05 had been received and accounted for, we immediately began corrective action to fully understand the true situation… (The unprecedented number of votes for both Jason and Sasha Lee) is evidence of the immense public following that both out Idols garnered during the course of the competition.”

On the question of why Hartman was not named the outright winner, Scholtemeyer said:

“The question (as to why Jason hasn’t been awarded the sole title) does have some merit. But we – in conjunction with FremantleMedia who owns the Idols franchise – felt the volume of votes for both contestants showed that the public loved them both, so we decided to award it jointly to be fair.”

What Jason and Sasha had to say about it

Hartman:

“Incredible, amazing… And also, to be part of the most unusual Idols ever is the best part… It’s been quite a whirlwind and obviously my family and I were quite shocked when we found out (there may be a mistake with the votes)… To come second and then find out that I’ve actually won and I’ve won alongside Sasha Lee… it’s amazing. I’m all about sharing the love!”

Ever the gentleman, respect to him for saying before the fact that he would split his prize, making it a helluva lot easier for everyone, well maybe not Sasha Lee.

Davids:

“I feel fine, funny enough (laughs)… I think Jason said it all… It’s been like a tornado this past week… Obviously it’s not a nice thing contemplating that the title could be taken away from you… But to be honest, I had psyched myself to hear Jason’s name being called out on the night (of the finale), so I felt something was amiss… But the main aim for me in this competition was to get a recording contract and I’ve still got that, so I’m fine. We’ve both worked so hard… And Jason deserves is as much as anyone else.”

What do people actually MEAN when they say someone deserves something as much as anyone else? I mean Jason deserved this more than ME for example? That one always gets me.

Other quotes from the press conference

“This is competition is driven by the public’s vote. While we acknowledge that this was not the scenario that we had expected or wanted, we are delighted with the outcome as both Jason and Sasha Lee are true Idols…” – Scholtemeyer

“The issue arose out of the sheer number of votes that came through after the cut-off time – there was an unprecedented volume of votes on the final night. And it was the significant number of votes outstanding – we’re talking hundreds of thousands – that alerted us there was a problem and which ultimately shifted the vote in Jason’s favour. But there were uncounted votes for Sasha Lee as well.” – Mark Rayner, CEO of DStv Mobile

The numbers:

• Jason Hartman received 1,3 million
• Sasha Lee Davids received 1,1 million
• Over 600 000 extra legitimate delayed votes were tallied in the recount.

Well that’s that I guess. I suppose we can’t always rely on technology, and a little drama never hurt anyone (well maybe Sasha-Lee ain’t too thrilled) but at least we have TWO potential has beens to follow now. That said, the odds on favourite in my mind to be around in a few years time is… you guessed it, Jason.

This just in folks, there is a mess up on the Idols vote count apparently. So is Sasha-Lee really the winner?

Let me guess theyre gonna cop out and declare them JOINT WINNERS.

This from the Mnet website.

The winner is determined by public vote alone based on the number of votes received for each of the two finalists. An unprecedented number of votes were received for the two finalists, Sasha Lee Davids and Jason Hartman.

M-Net’s post-show analysis revealed however, that a significant number of the SMS votes were received after the cut-off time of 18:05 on Sunday evening, due to possible external system latency.

Theo Erasmus, Channel Director: General Entertainment of M-Net SA, says: “The moment we were alerted to possible system problems, we contacted the mobile network operators to request additional data, which could be verified by independent auditors. M-Net hopes to complete this audit in the shortest time possible. It is crucial to M-Net that our viewers can be assured that every vote counts because accuracy is paramount in a show of this nature.”

The investigation will determine whether these SMS votes were sent by members of the public before the final cut-off time of 18:05 on Sunday evening, thus making them legitimate.

The three mobile network operators and M-Net’s service provider, are all co-operating with M-Net to ensure a speedy outcome.

The two finalists, Sasha Lee and Jason, have been made aware of this investigation and will receive all the necessary support they require during this process. They have both been advised that the results may change.

As soon as the investigation is complete, the results will be made known to the public.

Well Maybe Jason Hartman did win, I referred to this in this post [here]

Role on the results. Maybe Dave had the right idea [here]

Wouldn’t want to be in Atlantis if the result changes! Read what Sasha-Lee and Jason had to say here.

“We’re like a dysfunctional family,” he told News24. “We’ll miss Dave. His dry humour and lack of patience were an entertaining part of the show,” he said.

However, Cliff says that he can’t see why Thompson felt it necessary to leave the country.

He had wanted to leave after the audition process, but eventually agreed to stay for the season.

“You know I don’t agree with emigration. The global community, internet, world financial crisis and War on Terror have all proven that the only reason for emigration from any reasonably civilised place to another should be geography.

“To me that’s a bad reason to uproot yourself. I’m sure Dave and his family have their reasons – I just don’t see them.”

Helen Smit, the head of M-Net’s local production, said if there was another season of Idols, Thompson would have to be replaced.

See they’re all saying IF. I think they should give it a rest now for say like… umm 5 years?

Gareth CLiff should now be head honcho IF they go ahead with a new season.

Well the best of the bunch in my opinion was Jason, to me he was the most consistent and someone who could maybe have a career in the industry. Here’s to another Idols wash out, pity. Well done Sasha-Lee though, representing Cape Town.

Thank God, no more Mara for a year!