‘I fear for my wife and baby’s safety in South Africa’
Quins’ Renaldo Bothma opens up to Kate Rowan about his desperate plea to the nation’s president
It was Renaldo Bothma’s last resort. Sitting in an empty house, consumed by anger and frustration, he took out his phone, logged into his Twitter account and punched out a message to South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa.
The plea was simple: “Mr President… help me get my family back in the UK. Rugby brings us together. But that is really tough to do without your wife and baby.”
It is more than 10 weeks since Bothma, a former captain of Namibia, last saw his wife, Petrone, and daughter, Ava Grace. The family are separated because of a bureaucratic glitch surrounding the registration documents of the five-month-old as a South African citizen.
The flanker’s plea to Ramaphosa was driven by desperation. Premiership rugby for Harlequins has been a welcome distraction, but ultimately nothing comes close to the embrace of his family.
“The team played last Saturday night, we lost, I didn’t play but I went home and I was on my own again, my wife and kid weren’t there,” he says, in a quiet moment of reflection at his club’s Guildford training base. “I was alone,
I missed them and I was fed up. So I decided to tweet to see if something could happen, if there is someone who could help us.
“We don’t always speak about how we feel on the inside as rugby players but this has been the toughest 10 weeks of my life. Not seeing your little daughter... I have missed so much of her life already.
“Nobody knows where the documents are. For me, the worst thing is that we got Ava Grace’s UK visa in a week and her own country cannot even tell us where the documents are.”
The Bothmas welcomed their baby girl in Surrey but, as both her parents are South African citizens, she is ineligible for UK citizenship and must be registered as a South African citizen before being issued with a passport.
Her parents registered their daughter from their homeland rather than England, as they were
‘They are on a farm. Farm murders in South Africa are crazy, so it is always a stress for me’
advised the wait would be three months less.
To make an already painful situation even more agonised, the family had only returned to the Free State province – where Renaldo and Petrone grew up – because the back row was joining up with Namibia’s pre-world Cup training squad. Ultimately, he failed to make the cut, but while he returned to England and club duty with Quins, his wife and daughter had to stay behind.
Bothma, 30, says the family would never have returned to South Africa with their daughter if he had known he would not be selected for the World Cup.
“That was something else
I was angry about,” he says, with a sigh. Now, however, Bothma has more serious worries. He admits he is concerned for the safety of his young family while they are staying on Petrone’s family farm, because of the increased risk of raids and violent crimes on rural homes.
“For us, South Africa is a mess – it isn’t safe; it feels more and more dangerous. When we went back in August, we realised this is not where we want to be,” he says.
“Everything works in England, it is safe – you don’t have to constantly worry about someone stealing your car or someone hijacking you or breaking into your home. I am very worried about Petrone and Ava Grace’s safety because they are out on a farm. Farm murders in South Africa are crazy, so that is always a stress for me.
“It is tough because I should be the man in the house and the one to protect them, but I can’t do anything. I just want to get my wife and kid back to me as soon as possible.”
To outsiders, the joy of seeing Siya Kolisi captaining the Springboks to World Cup glory in Yokohama a fortnight ago signified a moment of change in wider South African society. But for all his pleasure at seeing one-time team-mates from the Lions, Sharks and Bulls defeat England, Bothma remains unconvinced of any lasting impact.
“The World Cup win was amazing for South Africa, and the country needed it, but it is not going to change anything in the government. There is still going to be crime. Rugby brings people together but it only lasts for so long,” he says.
“Look back at 1995 – South Africa won the World Cup then but things have not improved over the last 20 years. It is very sad because South Africa is a beautiful place with amazing people, but my first priority is to look after my family.”
Bothma was offered a week of compassionate leave by Harlequins, and his family have discussed him returning to South Africa to be with them. But with his contract at Harlequins running out at the end of the season, he and Petrone have chosen to prioritise his career.
“I have to train every day – this is my work, and I can’t just go away to South Africa,” he says. “It is a very difficult situation to be in. We feel helpless. We have to just keep on waiting it out.
“There is no feeling sorry for yourself, but I am just so fed up. On some level it has motivated me – I have so much anger in me, I try and vent it in training. That is the only thing that I have at the moment.”