The hashtag #iPad caused a stir on Msanzi Twitter Tuesday, thanks to President Cyril Ramaphosa, who misplaced his device few minutes before a speech, much to the shock of the audience.
Ramaphosa was in Cape Town, visiting the city’s port, where he addressed the media.
As he was about to deliver the keynote on live TV –which he was to read from his iPad, President Ramaphosa realised his iPad had gone missing.
“I had my iPad. Do you know where they took my iPad to? This is the problem of always handing out your gadgets to other people. It’s always best that I keep all these things with me all the time. I had my iPad. I had it in my hand. It’s gone. I lost it, it seems.”
The President had to wait a while until he was handed a backup copy of his speech.
Some found this hilarious while others decried what they thought to be the brazenness of a crime that it could happen to our first citizen.
Although many assumed it had been stolen, it appears crime may not have been to blame for the ‘lost-and-found’ episode.
A few hours later, the “first iPad”, as Ramaphosa’s head of digital called it, was found and back in the President’s hands, to his relief.
The Presidency said the President was only making a joke.
“There was no question of the iPad being missing or stolen. The President was making a light-hearted point while waiting for the iPad to be brought to him – which it was before he began his remarks to media,” Tyrone Seal, chief director of communications in the president’s office, said.