Now and then I write what I think are pretty intelligent columns in this space to try and prove that I'm a smart columnist who deserves to be taken seriously.

It seems I have been deluding myself on this point. You, my readers, think otherwise. For the past two weeks, my e-mail, Twitter and Facebook inboxes have been flooded with people asking me when I would be writing about the Mgqumeni saga.

Now, I wonder how many of you have been following the intriguing story of the "return from the dead" by celebrated maskandi star Mgqumeni Khumalo. If you haven't, the pipe-smoking Google artist more commonly known as former South African president Thabo Mbeki was correct.

A few years ago he spoke passionately of how South Africa was a nation of "two economies", which many have extrapolated to refer to two separate nations. I know what he means. It took me about six months to understand jokes about Joost in his birthday suit and socks, because I do not read Huisgenoot magazine.

Anyway, just in case you don't listen to Ukhozi FM, where I first heard about this story, this is the lowdown.

Mgqumeni, who hailed from Nquthu in northern KwaZulu-Natal, officially passed away in 2009. However, about two weeks ago news started filtering in that he had, in fact, not really died. All that had happened is jealous sorcerers had made a "photocopy" of him and given his family the wrong corpse to bury.

They had abducted the real Mgqumeni and kept him in a cave as a "slave" - for about two years. Details are sketchy as to what he was made to do during his incarceration.

This is not a unique story at all. Since I can remember I've heard of this practice, called ukuthwebula in Zulu. The literal meaning of ukuthwebula is "photography", as one might imagine. And a person who has been "photographed" is called umkhovu (presumably the original photo print).

Can we all please be mature about this and stop giggling. Let me interrupt myself to point out that a dear friend of mine, Siyabonga Ntshingila, is forever expressing how South African satirists, humorists and comedians have their work cut out. He reckons a satirist's job is to take a subtly ridiculous situation and embellish it a little to make it seem more absurd than it is.

But, as Siyabonga points out, South African stories are already so absurd that there's no room for satirists and humorists to play.

I must concur with him. So far, I have done nothing but share with you just the facts in this sordid tale. So back to the soul whisperers in Nquthu.

There are a few things that bothered me as soon as I heard this story. The obvious one is why anyone would go to such lengths to get rid of someone they hate. This ukuthwebula business makes Mafia vendettas seem silly and petty.

These countryside people from Nquthu must have some serious beef with each other.

I mean, why shoot a man and make him "sleep with the fishes" at the bottom of the Hudson River when you can "photograph" his soul, keep him in a cave and make him a 21st-century Kunta Kinte?

The next source of my disquiet about this affair is that the guy, the alleged original photo print (you know what I mean), had a gold tooth. The Mgqumeni who passed away did not.

Now, I'm not particularly au fait with this photography business, but I'm confused. If I hate someone so badly I want them to play Mary Poppins in a cave, why would I interrupt my photography activities to decorate his teeth?

And this is what leads me to the next source of my unrest. Mgqumeni had more than one wife, as one does when one is a maskandi star from that Nquthu area. It's just 20km from Nkandla, you know.

The police took the gold-toothed Lazarus's fingerprints which proved he was a fraudster named, Sibusiso Gcabashe, and then arrested him on a charge of stealing someone's identity and whatnot. But apparently two of his wives still insisted after that fact emerged that the man was truly the real Mgqumeni - based on a mole or wart on his manhood. I pause here for dramatic effect. What? There was intimacy with Lazarus?

This bothers me much more than any other aspect of this resurrection tale. I have since amended my will to state: "Thou shalt not search for warts on the penises of men who claim to be my photocopy."

Couldn't the wives test this man some other way, for example, asking him questions only he could answer, such as: "Who was found mounting Bab' Mnguni's favourite goat during the 2009 Battle of Isandlwana commemoration weekend?"

My point is obviously not that people who believe in individuals who rise from the dead are dumb. That would upset the Vatican and lead to me being given the Galileo treatment.

I often have no point. However, should I meet an untimely demise and a gold-toothed man claiming to be me appears and wants to revive The Headline Act, I want you, my people, to be vigilant.

Put him to the test by inundating him with e-mails asking him what the password is. And the password is "Kodak".