BREAKING. Is e.tv and Tropika Island of Treasure 3 going to get Heat for choosing someone from TVPlus as a contestant?

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Let's call this ballooning TV disaster the epic cluster ''you-know-what'' that its becoming: e.tv and the brand agency Stimulii willingly and knowingly including the assistant news editor (who covers reality TV shows) of TVPlus magazine as seemingly one of the ''normal'' contestants in Clover's brand-hyping Tropika Island of Treasure 3 reality show. Leaving the glossy gossip mag Heat! which is a fierce competitor, possibly forced to cover a show that has a contestant from a rival magazine in it!

I broke the news RIGHT HERE yesterday about Stimulii and e.tv who chose Clayton Morar, TVPlus assistant news editor, celebrity hunter, and reality TV writer as one of its 7 ''normal contestants'' out of the apparently thousands of South Africans who SMS'ed and MXit'ed to enter and who will be taking part in the next Tropika brand-infused installment of Tropika Island of Treasure 3 that starts shooting next week in Phuket, Thailand. Stimulii sees absolutely no conflict of interest with including this contestant. E.tv is also eerily silent on all media enquiries (as if the show is only on its schedule and has nothing personally to do with them) and one can only wonder whether e.tv's chief operating officer Bronwyn Keene-Young is aware, or at all concerned, about how damaging this kind of seemingly inappropriate behaviour is to the e.tv brand.

''Not that show again,'' sighed a print media insider at a newspaper who then laughed in disbelief, when I broke the news yesterday that Clayton Morar has been included as one of the ''normal everyday'' 7 contestants, together with 7 celebrities like Khanyi Mbau, Loyiso Gola and the former Miss SA Tatum Keshwar (who's also, yes, co-incidentally, happens to be a longtime personal friend of the contestant in question). Besides the apparently extremely compromising position that TVPlus magazine is placed in regarding how it might be covering this show (should it choose to do so) in which an editorial member is a contestant and which involves potential personal monetary gain, is the even worse way in which e.tv and Stimulii will now unintentionally be playing TVPlus and Heat! magazines off against each other. Why? Stimulii confirmed that its chosen Heat! as the official media partner. And yes, the situation becomes even more unbelievable.

Heat!'s current news editor Andre Neveling is becoming TVPlus' new editor from December. Will Heat! have to write and (directly or indirectly by implication) give a competitor at rival TVPlus exposure? Unthinkable. ''We became aware of Mr Morar's job while doing a telephonic interview with him to determine if his entry was valid and he met all our competition requirement [sic],'' says Samantha Moon, Stimulii director in answer to a media enquiry. ''We absolutely do not believe a conflict of interest exists. The definition of a conflict of interest, requires that someone benefits unduly. This is not the case here,'' Samantha Moon says.

Like, say, hobnobbing with celebrities and building future relationships in the showbiz and TV industry that can further careers for both sides? Like getting access to celebrity gossip and first-hand tete-a-tete's while working at a media outlet that generates money out of exactly that very ethereal asset? While Samantha Moon says ''we have a media partner on this campaign, Heat! We will not do or cause to be done, anything that could jeopardize our media partnership,'' sadly this is exactly what appears to is happening.

Tropika Island of Treasure 3 will start on e.tv in February. It would appear that neither Stimulii or e.tv, nor the contestant, nor whoever all okay'ed this, has/had any idea or gave any real thought to all of the compounding, and incredibly sensitive macro implications to all the various roleplayers involved. Once again, what is essentially a brand marketing campaign on TV trying to buy a measured treasure of goodwill, is in my opinion making all the wrong choices.

ALSO READ: e.tv's Tropika Island of Treasure 3 involved in dubious contestant selection.