BBA: How the houses merged

Big Brother dropped the biggest bombshell of the StarGame season on Sunday’s live eviction show when he merged the Upville and Downville houses!

Wati and Talia had been upgraded to Upville while Nafe and Tamara were evicted just moments before Big Brother delivered the remaining four Downville housemates to a surprised group in the Upville garden. The 12 remaining housemates will now compete over the next 35 days as individuals, in the hunt for the mammoth USD 300 000 prize!

Earlier in the show, last week’s evictee Barbz  checked in and told viewers that even though her stay in Upville hadn’t turned out as she had hoped, she felt that people had appreciated what she did and who she was. Quizzed about Goldie’s decision to save Prezzo instead of her, Barbz said she had expected things to turn out the way they had because “Goldie is a weak character and she needed Prezzo to hold her down for whatever reason”.

It was all about staying focused this week in both houses, with tasks designed to test the patience and attention spans of the housemates. The Downville BBF’s struggled to focus, losing their wager, while the Upville VIP’s won their wager and partied up a storm.

IK took viewers into Downville and asked the 2 nominated pairs to stand – but immediately summoned Malawi’s Nafe and Wati to the stage. As they said their goodbyes, Kris MacCormack from Sierra Leone’s Capital Radio pumped some tunes before South African superstar Toya Delazy rocked the stage with her searing chart-topper Love Is In The Air.

After showing Nafe and Wati their highlights, IK invited them to take a seat on the edge of the stage. He then summoned Talia and Tamara from Downville and gave them a look back at their time on Big Brother StarGame. The Sizwe Ntsaluba Gobodo auditor handed over the verified results to IK and he called the Malawian duo back up to join Talia and Tamara. Nafe was first to be evicted, after receiving the fewest country votes from Africa this week. Next to leave was Tamara, leaving Talia and Wati on stage. IK revealed that Wati had received the second-highest number of votes from Africa – but then told both housemates that they would both be upgraded to Upville!

As the duo made their way into the Upville house, viewers caught a peek at the remaining Downville housemates being led out of their garden. Toya Delazy returned to the stage to perform Pump It On as Africa pondered what Big Brother was up to. The Upville housemates were summoned to the garden and to their surprise, were greeted by a massive blue box with a flashing red button on a panel in front of it. The housemates excitedly pressed the button and waited to see what happened next. Slowly, a platform rose, revealing Kenya’s Malonza & Alex and Uganda’s Kyle & Jannette.

The housemates set about greeting each other as IK called them to the lounge and revealed the news that the houses had been merged and that nominations would continue as usual on Monday. Wati and Talia are the only housemates immune from nomination but everyone else, including the 4 housemates who joined Upville as part of the merge, will be able to make nominations and could be evicted next week. All the housemates will now be battling for the USD 300 000 prize as individuals from this week on.