Her passion is simple: talking. Whether she’s on the air, in front of the camera or across the table from you she loves nothing more than opening her mouth and engaging people in debate.
During 11 years in the media industry, award-winning journalist and broadcaster Redi Direko has tackled such heavyweights as Thabo Mbeki, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Nelson Mandela.
But there’s another passion in the 32-year-old media star’s life which has nothing to do with her career and everything to do with a certain doctor.
Brian Tlhabi, a GP, is the man Redi has lost her heart to and the guy who will be meeting her at the altar next month when they celebrate their spring wedding.
“It felt right and we were very clear about wanting to be together,” she tells us. “We spoke about settling down and when we finally did it felt right.”
She refuses to believe anything will go wrong on her special day. “I just think, ‘what could possibly happen when you have a group of people in the same room who love each other, who share their lives together - our family and friends?’ I don’t want a perfect wedding, I want a happy wedding and I think I’ll have that.”
It’s an exciting time for her but she’s trying not to let anything overwhelm her. And when it does she simply pulls on her trainers and goes for a run.
Running, she discovered back in 2004, is her salvation. “The plan was to go for a walk and create distance between myself and my desk. But walking didn’t help. I wanted to get the frustration out so I started jogging. Afterwards I couldn’t believe how far I’d gone - I ran just over 8 km. I thought to myself, ‘I can do this’ and I’ve never looked back.”
Brian, who has a practice in Soweto, has been married before and is the father of two daughters, Lesego and Ofentse. But the prospect of being stepmother to the girls doesn’t scare Redi. “These sorts of things don’t overwhelm me,” she says with confidence.