Olympians such as Gert Potgieter, Penny Heyns, Llewellyn Herbert and Marianne Kriel were all in the mix as Olympic fever hit the Mother City since early Saturday morning.
Potgieter, who made his debut as a very young athlete at the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne, was one of the first to run with the Olympic torch.
He and many others were surprised to see the big support at the starting point early in the morning in Delft.
”It is one of the greatest days in my life. It was fantastic to see the support of the youth,” said Potgieter afterwards.
Potgieter also broke the world record in the 400m hurdles before he missed the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome after a car accident in Germany.
”It was wonderful to see the Olympic spirit catching on. It brings people together in a spirit of peace,” Potgieter said.
Also in attendence in Delft was Minister of Sport and Recreation Makhenkesi Stofile.
”I was surprised by the big support,” Stofile said.
Herbert, a bronze medallist in the 400m hurdles at the last Olympics in 2000 in Sydney, also had his chance to run with the torch. He took a break from his European tour to carry the torch.
All along the route people were screaming and shouting as the torch was carried to Athlone Stadium.
It was then whisked by helicopter to Robben Island where Nelson Mandela also had his opportunity to carry the torch.
”It was again taken back to Athlone. The procession, with a lot of loud music and razzmatazz then moved past the Red Cross Children’s hospital where many young patients stood outside on the street to encourage the torch bearers.
”Thousands of people were gathering since noon on the Grand Parade. Lucas Radebe, ex-captain of Bafafa Bafana, would be the last to carry it on the Parade before the flame will leave tonight for South America.”
‘Just take my picture,’ says Mandela
Meanwhile, reports Ben Maclennan, icon met symbol on Saturday when for a few brief moments Mandela became the proud bearer of the Olympic flame.
The ceremony on Robben Island, where he was incarcerated for 18 years, was part of the torch relay in Cape Town and of the flame’s 34-city journey around the world.
The flame, protected in a special lantern, was helicoptered to the island from the mainland under the escort of city Mayor Nomaindia Mfeketo, who fetched it from Cairo on Friday.
In the concrete courtyard outside Mandela’s former prison cell, it was used to light an aluminium and olive wood torch, which was handed to Mandela.
Beaming, he held it aloft before going outside to pass it over to the first runner in a relay across the island, another former prisoner, Patrick Matanjana.
Mandela, who recently announced his retirement from public life, did not make a formal speech at the occasion.
However, he showed he has not lost his sense of humour.
”Don’t worry about the torch: just take my picture,” he joked with photographers.
”Oh, my old friends are here,” he said on recognising another journalist. ”When are you going on pension?”
Greek Olympic Committee chairperson Marton Simitsek recalled in a brief address in the courtyard that Cape Town bid against Athens for the 2004 games, but said Greece and South Africa were ”first of all friends”.
”The flame unite us [sic] … we come in place of pain and [in]justice to bring a symbol of friendship and justice.”
Stofile, himself a former political prisoner, said though South Africa lost out on the Games, it is fortunate the International Olympic committee has given it the chance to host the flame.
He also joked that he has warned South Africa’s Olympic athletes that those who do not bring home medals could find themselves locked up on Robben Island.
The Robben Island Museum said in a statement that the flame’s arrival on the island was symbolic of the triumph of South Africa’s liberation struggle, as political prisoners fought for the right to participate in sport on the island less than 20 years ago.
It said ex-islanders remembered a time in the 1980s when inmates passed a makeshift Olympic torch in celebration of their own mini Olympics, named the Robben Island Summer Games.
The event, organised by a committee of inmates, consisted of 15 Olympic events.
”Despite initial repudiation from prison authorities the Robben Island Summer Games became an annual event and the prisoners recognised sport as a force for social and political unity,” the museum said.
Cape Town is the eighth city to host the flame, lit from a mother flame in ancient Olympia, as it travels through 27 countries.
From Cape Town it goes to Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro, whose acting Mayor Carlos Nussman was in Cape Town to accept it on the Grand Parade on Saturday evening, then on the United States and back to Europe ahead of the Games’ official opening on August 13. — Sapa