Rugby drive for Buffalo Flats pupils

JOHN Bisseker’s Old Boys Rugby Reunion will be held on Sunday at the Buffalo Flats School Hall.

The aim of this event is to assist the upliftment/revival of a rugby programme at schools in the area.

The initiative, headed by Border Bulldogs team manager David Ruiters, will also be used as a public awareness programme that the legends will be embarking on from Sunday onwards.

“Rugby is dead in our community,” said Ruiters.

“We want to empower our youth in our communities and bring back the pride our area used to have because of rugby.

“We want our youth to move away from unbecoming behaviour on the streets,” he said.

“This particular event and a future rugby programme planned for schools, is the brainchild of a few concerned former rugby players in our community.”

Ruiters said they would honour fallen heroes as part of the effeort to ensure that the heritage of rugby in the area remains intact.

Key to the initiative is changing the attitude of the youth from negative to positive and this he believes can be achieved through sport.

The only surviving rugby club at Buffalo Flats is United RFC, and Ruiters said it, too, was dying a slow death. “It cannot be that we sit back while what used to keep this community going perishes on our watch,” said Ruiters. “Our youth have nothing to do after school and this is bad as it drives them to social ills like drug abuse and teenage pregnancy.

“The Sunday event is just the beginning but we will be engaged in a more radical programme going forward with other partners like Border Rugby to ensure that rugby here does not die completely.” — DDC