Rob Bentele wins Survivor SA

After 39 gruelling days, crazy blindsides and tricky alliances; Rob Bentele was crowned the sole survivor at the Survivor SA: Island of Secrets finale on Thursday night. He beat out Laetitia, Durao and Nicole to the title and R1-million prize money. He also won a voucher to the value of R10,000 from Cape Union Mart as part of his prize.

The man from Richards Bay, KwaZulu-Natal, got a majority of votes, with Danté, Meryl, Mmaba, Mike, Laetitia and Geoffrey all respecting the game that he had played. Nicole got four votes from the jury.

Rob described himself as the web that controlled the game. Speaking to the media after his win, he admitted that he had learnt to use his ego in his favour. I have been on a spiritual journey for quite a while and I thought that you needed to shed or suppress your ego, but I have learnt that there is a bad side and a good side and I need to accept them both. I stopped suppressing my ego because it is who I am. Instead I embraced it.

He said he had visualised winning from the moment he stepped into the game and was focused throughout. You see how deep your desire to fight is, and at times I was fighting for my life in the game. At times the line between the game and reality were blurred to me. I was completely submerged in the game.

Nicole was one of the most controversial figures in the game after blindsiding several of the jury members. She said fan reaction had been split between those who loved her and those who despised the way she played the game.

“I love both equally because it creates more of an excitement around the show,” she added. Rob was also a hit with viewers and received the most votes in the fan favourite competition to walk away with a new Mahindra.