Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(S.Afr.) a lazy lout, a country bumpkin, a gullible person.

1953		Drum (Johannesburg) May 40: They make sure, with their guns and knives, that they win everything or don’t lose too much to any ‘moggoe’ [DSAE].
1958		in L.F. Freed Crime in S. Afr. (1963) 127: ‘Da ap toun tjat ons met moggos’ (In town we play dice and gamble with the stupid ones).
1963		Wilson & Mafeje Langa 71: He was sent home in 1955 [...] by his senior home-boys whom he referred to as moegie – country bumpkins.
1970		Drum (Johannesburg) Aug. 23: You can see I’m not a moegoe (country bumpkin) [DSAE].
1971		M.O. Mtshali ‘The Detribalised’ in Chapman & Dangor Voices from Within (1982) 74: He’s a ‘clever’ / not a ‘moegie’; / he never say baas / to no bloody white man.
1977		F. Dike First South African 4: This location is full of mogoes.
1979		A. Brink Dry White Season 180: ‘What’s this mugu got to do with him?’ [...] ‘You may not think it [...] but this rotter used to be one of the top lawyers in the township, lanie.’.
1980		M. Melamu ‘Bad Times, Sad Times’ in Mutloatse Forced Landing 50: I tell him to lay off [...] Die moegoe vat my nie koptoe nie. He ignores my brotherly advice.
1982		M.V. Mzamane Children of Soweto 19: We weren’t the moegoes they sometimes took us for.
1985		B. Simon ‘Outers’ Born in the RSA (1997) 70: Ek is Bles se cherry, Auntie Gwen, het jy hierdie moegoe gehoor?
1986		Sophiatown in M. Orkin At the Junction (1995) 145: Moegoes nou moet voetsak – All the stupids must bugger off now.
1987		(con. 1950s) G. Moloi My Life 216: We were all overshadowed by these country boys referred to as muggus. I tell you they started driving fast cars while the city boys could hardly afford a bike.
1990		A. Dangor Z Town Trilogy 105: Any young man of my age who was still a virgin in the township was a moegoe.
2000		(ref. to 1940s) C. Glaser Bo-Tsotsi 107: The antithesis to ‘clever’ was moegoe, a country bumpkin.
2007		IOL News (Western Cape) 14 Dec. 🌐 There has been an attempt to portray Zuma as a moegoe, a plaasjaapie, a rural person.
2011		Mail and Guardian (Johannesburg) 8 Apr. 🌐 Socially I wasn’t a moegoe.