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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Entertainment
Zara Woodcock

Oti and Motsi Mabuse's mum says family's royal link is 'nonsense' in new DNA Journey

Oti and Motsi Mabuse's mother dubbed the family's royal connection 'nonsense' during an appearance on ITV's DNA Journey.

The sisters explored their family ties in a recent episode and discovered they're related to royalty in South Africa.

Their mother Dudu didn't believe the findings and said the idea of them being direct descendent of royalty is utter 'nonsense'.

DNA Journey discovered that the Mabuse family are descendants of a Kekana royal family in Hammanskraal, northwest South Africa.

It was shown that the queen of that village is Dudu's great-grandmother.

"She’s like, 'This is nonsense!'" Oti said of her mother's shocked reaction.

Their mother didn't believe they had a royal connection (Collect)

Speaking to the Radio Times, she said: "I think that’s from not feeling valuable and being told you’re not worth something. She can’t understand she’s from royal blood!"

Motsi and Oti both appeared on Strictly Come Dancing but the latter departed the series last year.

Motsi remained as one of the judges on the panel and recently opened up about what it's like working on the show.

The South African-German dancer is fluent in five languages and can get by in a sixth, but has to ask Strictly co-star Craig Revel Horwood to translate some contestants’ thick dialects.

She is fluent in English, German and three South African languages including Afrikaans and Setswana, and also speaks a little of her husband Marius Lepure’s native tongue, Romanian.

The Mabuse family discovered they have royal links (ITV)
DNA Journey discovered that they're descendants of a Kekana royal family (ITV)

But she admitted to Mirror: “On Strictly, I really struggle with people that come from the North.

“I’m like: ‘Can you please translate?’ It’s so strong, and I just don’t understand. It starts with ‘hello’ and then it’s over. Like, what?”

Asked if she struggled to understand the strong Lancashire accent of Blackburn-born TV presenter AJ Odudu, who competed in the 2021 series, Motsi says: “Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes! But there have been quite a few from the North, and I’m always asking Craig. I’m just trying to understand. It’s not easy.”

Marvelling at the variety of British accents, she said: “You all speak differently. Every time I’m in this country, I really have to concentrate. Some people, I just don’t know, are we speaking the same language? There’s a lot of different types of accents here.”

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