Regina Blaque Is Dragging the News — and Refusing to Let Queer Lives Be Erased

In a media landscape often dominated by grim headlines and distant reporting, Regina Blaque arrives in full drag with lashes, wit and purpose. As the host of Drag the News – Mamba Edition with Regina Blaque, MambaOnline’s bold new digital series, Regina is not just delivering the news. She is reclaiming it.

Behind the glamour stands a Johannesburg-based drag queen whose journey into drag began far from the spotlight. Growing up in Eikenhof, southern Johannesburg, queerness existed quietly, if at all.

Regina first stepped into drag in 2018 while studying law at the University of Johannesburg, and the transformation was immediate and profound. “The first time I put Regina’s face on, something joyful clicked,” she recalls. “Little Rikus finally got to breathe.”

What started as performance quickly became a calling. Drag opened doors into media, storytelling and international travel, but it also sharpened Regina’s understanding of home, community and ubuntu.

After working in media abroad, she returned to South Africa’s drag scene with renewed clarity and intention, determined to tell queer stories with honesty, warmth and flair. That commitment is evident in everything she does, from her Afrikaans-language podcast Queer in Afrikaans to her latest collaboration with MambaOnline.

For Regina, partnering with MambaOnline is a full-circle moment. “Finding the platform eleven years ago changed how I viewed myself,” she says. “It was my window into a world I didn’t know existed.”

Now, as a digital correspondent, she is helping open that same window for a new generation of queer audiences. Drag the News is designed to meet people where they scroll, combining satire, sincerity and drag spectacle to humanise stories that too often feel overwhelming or abstract.

“I’m not here to replace journalism,” Regina explains. “I’m here to hold space for the people living these stories.” Using drag as a storytelling tool brings warmth and accessibility to serious LGBTQ+ issues, inviting audiences to engage rather than turn away. The series makes no claim to neutrality, because, as Regina puts it, “you can’t be neutral about human rights.”

That refusal to be neutral is powerfully echoed in the photographs accompanying this feature. In them, Regina wears a dress inscribed with the names of queer people murdered in homophobic and transphobic attacks. The garment is striking, but its meaning cuts far deeper than aesthetics. It is a tribute to lives stolen by hate and a demand for justice that has yet to arrive.

“The photos carry a weight that goes beyond the aesthetic,” Regina says. “I wore a dress inscribed with the names of our siblings murdered in homophobic and transphobic attacks, lives stolen by hate. This is a tribute, but it’s also a massive statement: queer lives deserve justice.”

Her words land heavily in a country still grappling with unanswered violence. Following the murder of Kwakhanya Mhlanganisi, and nearly a year after the assassination of Imam Muhsin Hendricks, accountability remains absent. For Regina, that silence is not neutral. It is devastating. “That silence sends a message to queer people about our value,” she says. “I want these photos to represent a refusal to let those names be forgotten.”

This duality, joy and grief, humour and rage, is at the heart of Drag the News – Mamba Edition. Regina positions herself as a “big drag sister,” guiding audiences through complex issues with honesty and care. The goal is not just to inform, but to connect, especially with queer people who rarely see their lived experiences reflected with dignity in mainstream media.

Looking ahead, Regina hopes the series signals a future where queer storytelling in South Africa is bold, tender and unapologetically human. “We aren’t a novelty,” she says. “We are essential witnesses to our own time.”

With every episode, every headline delivered in heels, and every name stitched into memory, Regina Blaque proves that drag is not an escape from reality. It is a lens that sharpens it, colours it, and demands that we look, listen and remember.