Inspiring Kolisi brings together nation still plagued by division and suspicion
South Africa is in unison – for once – behind the captain and his men, write Peta Thornycroft in Johannesburg and Roland Oliphant
When Siya Kolisi leads the Springboks out tomorrow, it will mark a historic moment for South African rugby. The first black captain of the national side, leading a squad widely considered the first to have been picked entirely on colour-blind merit, this team are unifying the country in a manner not seen since Nelson Mandela handed Francois Pienaar the World Cup in 1995.
Few people in South Africa will be looking on with more satisfaction than Valence Watson. “This is what we fought for,” the 67-year-old said in Port Elizabeth. “To see a black guy lead a Springboks side, and hopefully win the World Cup. People died for this. I just think it is fantastic.”
For the past year, Watson and his three brothers have been in the news for the wrong reasons, facing allegations of corruption at the heart of the ANC. But 40 years ago, they were synonymous with the fight for racial equality in South African rugby. Their story reflects in microcosm South Africa’s troubling journey from the idealism and hope that followed the collapse of apartheid in 1994, to the uncertainty and disillusionment widespread today – and the remarkable role rugby still plays in healing the country.
Watson and his brothers, Gavin, Ronnie and Daniel, were raised on a farm in the Eastern Cape, where British settlers had instilled rugby not only amongst the white population but, also uniquely, the black community. Rugby-mad and with a commitment to racial equality instilled by their laypreacher father, they were in their 20s when they took on the apartheid ban on mixed-race contact sports.
“A journalist came into our shop, and heard us playing Christian music. He said, ‘Clearly you guys seem to be Christian, won’t you come and help us with coaching in the townships?’” said Watson, who runs a wildlife estate near Port Elizabeth. “After we realised they were great players, we said, ‘Why don’t we play a game?’ So we did. And we were breaking the law.”
Pressure from the apartheid-era authorities began almost immediately. The youngest brother, Daniel, widely seen as the most talented winger in the country, was offered a place in a Springboks party touring France in 1977 if he quit coaching blacks. He refused, giving up what could have been a glittering career.
They braved arson, harassment, and even attempts on their lives in a campaign that became an inspiration for non-white rugby players across the country.
“They had a huge influence in the game, they supported our non-racial beliefs and values,” said Sammy Claassen, a mixed-race activist from Langebaan in the Western Cape. “There is more than 100 years of rugby among us coloureds. We grew up for generations with no other sport at any schools. But no coloureds could play for the Springboks, and we had this slogan, ‘No normal sport in an abnormal society’. The Watsons were part of our rugby.”
“They took huge risks,” said Hendrik Snyders, head of history at the National Museum in Bloemfontein and a researcher into black and coloured rugby. “Their decisions in life were not only about rugby. They were politically involved in the underground in the Eastern Cape. This became a natural progression towards non-racial sport with their strong anti-apartheid commitment.”
The brothers’ clothing shop in Port Elizabeth – the home of black rugby and the centre of the political struggle against apartheid – was a safe haven for antiapartheid activists. The middle brothers, Valence and Ronnie, were undercover activists for ANC intelligence. By the time apartheid ended, they were household names in South Africa, and on the verge of international celebrity. In 1997, their story was turned into a book by the Australian writer Kristin Williamson.
But as the years passed, the family were accused of abusing their connections to the ruling party and the rugby establishment for economic and sporting gain.
In 2007, Cheeky Watson was accused of using the family’s influence with government and rugby officials to get Luke Watson, his son, selected for the Springboks in defiance of the head coach’s wishes. Cheeky denied the allegations. In 2017, he was arrested on allegations of fraud at the East Cape Rugby Union, charges which he also denies. The case has not yet come to trial.
In January this year, a video emerged of Gavin Watson appearing to dole out what he jokingly referred to as “monopoly money” to several colleagues. Angelo Agrizzi, a former chief operating officer of Gavin Watson’s company Bosasa who came forward as a whistleblower, claimed the money was intended for bribes, and that more than 80 officials were on a regular payroll in exchange for securing state tenders for Bosasa and averting investigations. The allegations landed the company and the Watson family in front of the Commission on State Capture – an inquiry set up by Cyril Ramaphosa, the current president of South Africa, to investigate allegations of massive corruption under the government of his predecessor, Jacob Zuma. Gavin Watson died in a car crash in August, but Valence Watson, who was not involved in Bosasa, calls the allegations against his brother “absolute garbage, to put it mildly”. “He had nothing to do with it. The lies will eventually be proven to be lies,” he said. He claimed the commission had not called him to give his side of the story, and the allegations were part of a right-wing plot against the ANC: “If I take off my sporting hat, and put on my hat as an underground activist for the ANC, did you really think the right wing that controlled this country for 300 years would just keel over and go? They are alive and well.”
The family’s bravery in the struggle against apartheid is not in dispute, said Adriaan Basson, the editor in chief of News 24, and the author of Blessed by Bosasa, a book about the scandals. “But they have also had this kind of dark underbelly. The ANC had to operate like a syndicate because they were banned in South Africa, so they had to find resources in illegal ways.” Those old networks, says Basson, were typical of the shady operations that came to epitomise the ANC’S descent from the party of Mandela into a swamp of controversy that it became under Zuma. “I think their story has coincided with that of the ANC. The ANC is absolutely mired in controversy today. We have a long road ahead of us in clearing up that decade of corruption under Jacob Zuma,” he said.
Watson has accused Basson of working with Agrizzi and trying to bring the ANC into disrepute on behalf of right-wing whites. Basson dismissed that as “conspiracy”. It is typical of the suspicions and divides that continue to plague this country nearly three decades after apartheid ended.
The one thing that does cross those divisions is the prospect of seeing a black player from the Eastern Cape lead the Springboks on to the pitch tomorrow. “Kolisi is just a fantastic captain,” said Basson. “He brings the team together and is inspirational. The whole country is behind this team in way they have not been before.”