Stop treating transformation as swart gevaar

HEYNEKE Meyer has showed his hand.

You guessed it, it’s a snow white hand with a few black spots.

The almost exclusively white Springboks ensemble Meyer has assembled to go play in England must have left Louis Luyt spinning with excitement six feet underground.

Perhaps Meyer was emboldened by sport minister Fikile Mbalula’s statement that transformation in rugby will take time (how long, Mr Minister?) and that we shouldn’t expect change overnight.

If one follows that level of logic, the transformation of the honourable one from a common politician to enjoying the liberties of serving in the executive should not have happened overnight.

Surely he is sharp enough to appreciate that 21 years is anything but overnight.

But the minister is just being a politician who, like his predecessors, with the exception of the late Steve Tshwete, is not prepared to upset the applecart and break the barriers of racial exclusion that keep the blacks at

Surely Mbalula is sharp enough to appreciate that 21 years is anything but overnight

bay. Squad selections by their very nature will never get a universal nay or yea because we are not homogenous.

But the attempt by some among us to defend the indefensible that has continued ad nauseum is nauseating.

The transformation of this team has been in a 21-year hibernation. The SA Rugby Union’s attempts have been a half-hearted, kneejerk reaction to a platform that can contribute to fostering meaningful social cohesion.

In these 21 years there’s been a number of talented black players who deserved to be in the national team ahead of the ageing tried and tested and crockered brigade.

We will never know how far winger Jongi Nokwe, the first Bok who scored a record four tries — not against wishy-washy opposition, but against Australia — would have gone had a knee injury not confined him to four caps.

Gcobani Bobo was always a special breed, a fact confirmed by his captaincy of all the junior Bok teams. But when it came to graduating to the senior side he was always seen as a quota player and was confined to only six appearances, with only three starts. There is enough black talent. Flyhalf Elton Jantjies and hooker Scara Ntubeni are but two who had fantastic Super Rugby seasons for the Lions and Stormers respectively.

What happens to the sea of black players who make waves year-in and year-out at the Craven Week?

What blocks their upward mobility? Meyer earned his coaching stripes when he brought bite back into the Bulls during his five-year tenure in Pretoria. It is one thing converting the Bulls from a bunch of no-hopers to Super Rugby championship status.

But the Springboks are a different kettle of fish. They represent the nation, not a province.

And this is the reality Meyer and his predecessors are refusing to acknowledge. That must not take 21 years to see.

When the Boks line up against Japan at the Brighton Community Stadium on September 18 to kick-off their bid for a third grab of the glittering gold that is the Webb Ellis Trophy, they’ll sing the national anthem — sing it at the top of their voices they do.

The South African flag will be fluttering in the wind.

The simpletons of the south are, as always, at pains to extol everyone to keep race out of it.

And oh, this whole thing of people standing on podiums screaming leave politics out of sport is the most disingenuous thing.

It was the apartheid politicians in their collective divisive racial wisdom who decided to bring politics into the game.

Everything was built on race. The ignorant are quick to draw parallels with Bafana Bafana, not knowing that football fought segregation at the height of apartheid.

That debate is a non-starter. South Africans need to be committed, devoted and dedicated and stop treating transformation as some swart gevaar.

Of course frustration over transformation will make way for jubilation when they beat Japan in their opening match. Or it will intensify if Eddie Jones and his men cause an upset?

It was the apartheid politicians . . . who decided to bring politics into the game