South Africa has been plunged into a fresh debate over the racial make-up of its sports teams 14 years after the country emerged from apartheid into a unifying rainbow nation.
As the cricket squad prepared on Wednesday to fly to Bangladesh after a furious row over the dearth of black players in its line-up, white rugby legends protested against government pressure on selectors to put colour ahead of ability.
”It is important for players and the country that teams be chosen on merit,” said former Springbok captain Wynand Claassen.
”We have players of colour who are among the best in the world. There is no need for the government to interfere and create artificial representivity.
”No player wants to be known as a quota player.”
The racial composition of South African sports teams remains an emotive issue for black and white alike nearly two decades after the lifting of international sporting boycotts of the 1970s and 1980s when the country allowed no black sportsmen to compete on the global arena.
And despite the changing face of the public and private sectors since the African National Congress (ANC) took over the government in 1994, the sports-mad nation’s rugby and cricket squads and supporters remain largely white while soccer is widely perceived as a black past-time.
The country has failed to build on a unique chance for sports unity since the first black president Nelson Mandela celebrated South Africa’s 1995 Rugby World Cup victory with the team, holding aloft the William Webb Ellis trophy in a replica captain’s jersey.
Last week, national cricket coach Mickey Arthur was sacked as a team selector with Cricket South Africa (CSA) president Norman Arendse accusing him of ”cocking a snook” at transformation after the provisional 14-man squad for an upcoming tour of Bangladesh included only four players of colour.
Arthur’s ousting has since been overturned and the squad twice rejected by Arendse confirmed, but few believe that is the end of the story.
On Tuesday, a group of former Springbok rugby players and captains joined pressure group AfriForum for a meeting with South African Rugby Union president Oregan Hoskins, complaining about the use of race as a selection criterion.
AfriForum, which represents white minority interests, gave Hoskins a memorandum demanding a stop to racial discrimination.
”Following South Africa’s re-entry into international sport … the post-1994 ANC government has proceeded to follow a clear and aggressively pursued agenda to re-racialise sport, especially rugby, at all levels,” stated the document.
The country saw the appointment last month of its first black Springbok coach, Peter de Villiers, who was quick to stress that merit rather than skin colour would determine selection.
De Villiers was chosen over Heyneke Meyer, the white coach of the Pretoria-based Bulls, with Hoskins announcing at the time that ”the appointment did not take into account only rugby reasons”.
Meyer has expressed disappointment at the decision, stating at the weekend: ”I am a South African, and if I cannot coach the Boks, I don’t want to coach at all.”
Hoskins said on Tuesday there was an urgent need for the sport to change its white image, but imposing quotas was not the way to do it.
”We tried it in the past but it was not successful because it had all sorts of negative connotations. People perceived it as a form of window-dressing while players themselves were made to feel inferior.”
Vast numbers of South Africans were not exposed to rugby, said Hoskins, which prevented talented players from rising through the ranks.
Sport and Recreation Minister Makhenkesi Stofile has said race quotas ”are out” but selectors are left in little doubt that their jobs will be on the line if blacks continue to account for only a minority of squad members.
Even President Thabo Mbeki has entered the fray, saying the country might need to sacrifice results for a higher goal.
”It might not be that therefore you win all the games, but in the end you win this other thing which is building up of a truly representative South African side,” he told lawmakers last year.
Parliament recently passed an amendment Bill allowing the sports minister to issue guidelines for the promotion of ”equity, representivity and redress in sport”. – AFP
