Rhodie, the Rhodes University's mascot was kidnapped by a 5fm DJ over the Intervarsity weekend. However, concerned members of the student community can breathe a sigh of relief after a ransom agreement was reached with 5fm DJ Roger Goode on Tuesday 21 August.
Rhodie, the Rhodes University's mascot was kidnapped by a 5fm DJ over the Intervarsity weekend. However, concerned members of the student community can breathe a sigh of relief after a ransom agreement was reached with 5fm DJ Roger Goode on Tuesday 21 August.
Local animal lovers will also be glad to know that the ransom money will go to the Grahamstown SPCA, which was recently broken into and vandalised.
Goode was in town to perform at Rhodes University's Intervarsity field party last Saturday and decided to return to Johannesburg with the local university's big purple rat mascot, Rhodie, as his captive. He even released a video online where he not-so-anonymously threatened to harm Rhodie unless people tuned into his show and offered an adequate ransom.
During his 7pm-10pm show on Monday he took numerous calls from anxious Rhodes students who were more than willing to negotiate with him to see Rhodie return home unharmed. One woman suggested they have a pants-off dance-off in Friars, while another offered to trade the university's Dean of Students.
Rhodents to the rescue
A group of three past Rhodians arrived at the 5fm studios and took Goode hostage for the last hour of his show – but still Rhodie remained a captive.
It was the Student Representative Council's media councillor, Bradley Bense, who made the winning bargain. On Goode's Tuesday show it was announced that Bense had organised to donate the ransom money of R500 to the SPCA. He also hopes to source paint and computer equipment from Rhodes departments and enlist volunteers to repaint the vandalised SPCA offices and replace computers that were smashed by vandals last weekend.
At the time of going to press Rhodie was yet to come home safely, but according to Bense: Rhodie is being dropped at an undisclosed time and location in Grahamstown before the end of the week. "In order to keep the SAPS completely out of the picture, those were the only details I was given," he said.
