Mr Zuma, South African sport is at war

South Africa’s three major sports are in turmoil and the problems lie with the politicians and individual administrators whose racism, negligence and megalomania are coming home to roost.

South African cricket, after two successful series wins and a grand send-off for Shaun Pollock, is in the process of creating long-term hatred by the obsession with race of Norman Arendse, its president.

South African rugby, having just won the World Cup, is on the brink of disintegration — occasioned by interference by sports administrators and politicians.

South African soccer, while going through a financial boom, has badly let down the youth of this country by feathering its own nests while another lost generation of players is visited upon us.

All three have failed to secure the television rights for the masses.

Transformation in sport, must mean that the youth of our country who are overwhelmingly black in number must be tapped, sifted, taught and then released on to a world stage.

It does not, nor can it ever, mean that tokens are forced upon our teams, because that would allow the administrators to pocket the loot and claim that transformation is taking place.

Our kids are being neglected because we see a few tokens on the sports fields.

After 14 years of democracy, these three sports have failed this country in terms of developing our incredible pool of talent.

In my opinion, soccer is by far the worst offender. In a country where foreigners are stunned by the incredible natural ability of our black kids, we have not produced one player worthy of a Jomo Sono or any of the great ball players of his time. It’s all mundane, pedestrian garbage, with many foreigners playing in our PSL.

We should be exporting tons of players instead of a trickle. Africa should fear us — instead we are the laughing stock of this continent.

In all three sports the money is pouring in but nothing is being achieved in terms or real transformation — just racists who want tokens so they can lie to us about the black players coming through.

They aren’t! Not in a fraction of the numbers they should, because the structures to bring them through don’t exist or are nowhere near where they should be.

If, Mr Zuma, you are the champion of the poor and the oppressed, then kick racism out of our sport, force these administrators and politicians to intervene only where they are applicable (that is, seeing that the bulk of this money goes into development) and start policing how the money in these sports are spent.

Give us national teams that are worthy of a rainbow nation by empowering the children and ridding us of these self-interested gentlemen.

Anyone who tells me that the only way to level the playing field is tokenism understands this: black children are as good as — and, in many sports the world over, better than — the rest. If you deny them fields, equipment and structures that can identify their potential, they may as well not exist.

Tokenism is the cop-out that allows administrators to enrich themselves without ploughing the money into these children.

Demographics tell you that, properly done, South African teams on merit should be 75% black. Politicians and administrators are responsible for it being otherwise. Tokenism allows them to keep on doing it because people see sub-standard black players coming through and pass it off as transformation.

That’s an insult to the ability of our black youngsters who are naturally sportsmen and -women but aren’t given a chance because these people are allowed to keep the money and lie to the public.

Let’s send them into the wilderness and give our kids a chance.