Not representativeWHEN Nelson Mandela strode onto a field in 1995—a year after the birth of South Africa’s democracy—images of him wearing the green and gold of the national rugby team became a stirring symbol of his commitment to racial unity. His celebration of the World Cup victory of the Springboks that year before a crowd of mostly white Afrikaners prompted chants of “Nelson, Nelson!”
Two decades on, little racial unity accompanies the Springboks’ appearance at the 8th Rugby World Cup in England. Why, critics ask, are only nine players in the total squad of 31 non-white, when only 10% of the population is white? Worse still, in a country that remains obsessed by minute gradations of race, why are only four of those nine African, rather than of mixed race? Xenophobes splutter too: of those four black Africans, the one who plays most often originally came from Zimbabwe.
Embarrassed, the government has stood behind the team and its conservative white coach, Heyneke Meyer. His response, under fire, has been to swear undying loyalty to the country. None of that has stopped the invective. One of the...Continue reading
Source: Middle East and Africa http://ift.tt/1LQ0rl6
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