In human rights week, young banker Bonga Bangani became an unlikely hero. He sent a five-page letter to Investec, his former employer, complaining about how he had been treated in the course of a one-year contract. His story has resonated with the experiences of many young, black people, who have flooded him with emails and blogged about his letter.
What was Bangani’s experience? It was not the naked racism of separate facilities that was a normal part of the working lives of previous generations. It was about the racially tinted glass ceiling still so common in many workplaces. Bangani felt that he had not been adequately mentored or integrated into the networks of support and camaraderie that can make or break a young talent. An Italian colleague who enjoyed these support systems was quickly given a decent client list, good working facilities and opportunities to travel. Bangani spoke not only of racially discriminatory opportunities but also of different pay scales.
Sit with a group of young, black professionals and they will tell identical stories. More should do what Bangani did by speaking up, preferably before they quit in frustration. His action caught the attention of President Thabo Mbeki, who quoted him in his letter last week, and also of Investec boss Steven Koseff.
Bangani has said he will not return to Investec, but he has been a trailblazer for future young, black bankers. No doubt, his bravery will ensure that this bank (and indeed the entire financial services sector) will take a hard look at operations and human resource practice.
Our article on the subject this week also finds that many young, white people feel as if they are racially discriminated against in the workplace. This of concern, too, for we should not merely exchange one hue of discrimination for another.
In addition to individuals taking power and speaking up, corporations must also ensure that “equal opportunity” and “empowered” are not just terms they use to win political kudos. It must be practised with systems where grievances can be taken up and with training to harvest the many fruits that diverse environments offer.
Of course, Bangani’s snap-shot is of one privileged corner of South African life. Forty-seven years after Sharpeville, wellbeing is still too often defined by race. And in the deeper recesses of our nation, on the farms and the mines, racism is still raw and deeply entrenched. It is to these corners that we must turn our most urgent attention.
It’s just not cricket
Nowhere is the role of sport role in society more exaggerated than in the oft repeated quote by Bill Shankley, the former Liverpool football club manager, who said that the game is not a matter of life and death, but much more important than that.
Sport is most certainly an important agent of social cohesion and an equalising opportunity for many of those on the periphery of society. It is a unique way of instilling in the young the benefits of focused attention, commitment and continuous improvement, qualities that cannot be overstated in individuals and nations, particularly those in developing countries.
But as illustrated by events related to the cricket World Cup currently being played in the West Indies, sport can indeed be a destructive force for jingoism and utter thuggery.
Team sports in particular have a knack of locating the Neanderthal need, mostly found in men, for a sense of belonging and the desire to inflict suffering on those who don’t.
As with religion, sport in the wrong hands can serve as the opiate of the people, diverting their attention from the real social and political issues at hand, and deferring to others the vicissitudes of their fortunes.
Indian supporters stormed the house of the national team’s wicket keeper Mahendra Singh Dhoni, burned effigies and chanted “death to Dhoni” after he was dismissed for a duck, when lowly Bangladesh defeated the fancied Indian side.
Police in Jamaica are investigating the possibility that Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer’s death was related to the misfortunes of his team, which was knocked out in the first round.
Cricket and the passions it inflames in the sub-continent is not unique in giving sport a bad name. For as long as records have been kept, sport has been used as a proxy war, an outlet for a broader political and social statements. In the 1930s the rivalry between African-American boxer Joe Louis and German Max Schmeling became a microcosm of the tensions between America and Nazi Germany, instead of a duel between two men who were friends outside the ring. Similarly the infamous killing of Andres Escobar, the Colombian defender who scored an own goal in the 1994 football World Cup.
If the suspicions around Woolmer’s death are proved to be correct then George Orwell’s observation is apt: “Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound up with hatred, jealousy and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence. In other words, it is war without the shooting.”
A combination of crass commercialism and narrow nationalistic fervour has replaced the true spirit of sport. It’s just not cricket.