Godfather of Zim basketball

UNLIKE Ronald Garura, Farai Tumbare, Vitalis Chikoko or the litany of basketball stars that have emerged from this country, the name Edgar Rogers is one least likely to strike a chord with an ordinary sportsperson. Yet it is one that should.

After all, Rogers is one of a handful of people who hold the distinction of having represented the country under the Rhodesian regime, Zimbabwe-Rhodesia (after the Unilateral Declaration of Independence) and independent Zimbabwe.

Now 72-years-old, Rogers was the first captain of the Zimbabwe national basketball team after independence.

He is credited with securing the country’s re-admittance into the International Basketball Federation in 1982.

Even after having been one of the founding members of Arcadia Bucs, a former Basketball Union of Zimbabwe president and ex-Zimbabwe Olympic Committee secretary-general, it is, however, his ability to break racial barriers as a “coloured” (mixed race) that he is most famed for and proud of.

And this all started with a conversation with the late Dr Edison Furatidzayi Chisingaitwi Sithole, a former veteran nationalist.

“One of the things I hate the most is racism and snobbery, and unfortunately, both played a huge part in my basketball career.

“However, it is words of encouragement I received from the late Sithole that I still hold dear to my heart and helped me through some trying times,” said Rogers.

“It was just before independence, 1976 I think, and I had been selected into the national team for a tour to South Africa along with club teammates Kimon Raftopolous and Paul Little (a white Bucs player).

“I was vice captain on this tour, but just before departure we received word that South Africa, still under Apartheid at the time, were mulling cancelling the tour due to our presence.

“A lot of manoeuvring was done for us to be allowed to travel, but only on the provision that we would be recognised as unofficial whites.

“It was that term that I hated and the one that left me contemplating refusing to go.

“I was then summoned by the late Sithole, and a few other Zanu PF officials, who told me to go as it would, as they said, ‘open the door for others’.

“That turned out to be the reassurance I needed, and, as I look back, it ended up being quite a successful tour for us.”

The team reportedly won seven out of the eight games it played and became the third multi-racial national team to play in Apartheid South Africa after the New Zealand All Blacks rugby team and the French rugby team.

“We caused quite a stir, especially in Cape Town and more so in Johannesburg, where my friends, along with other locals, were allowed into the stadium to watch.

“South Africa had just got countrywide television and our game in Pretoria was one of the first basketball games to be televised,” Rogers said.

Now in retrospect, this barrier-breaking tour could never have been imagined by a boy who some 13 years prior, had no idea what basketball was. But it was not the first sport for Rogers, now based in the United Kingdom, neither would it become his most significant.

Born on June 27, 1947, Rogers’ first flirtation with the sport began during the summer of 1963, when the United States of America-based Harlem Globetrotters came to Zimbabwe for an exhibition match.

“I learnt at predominantly non-basketball playing schools during my formative years and it was when I was at Morgan High School that I had my first taste of basketball.

“I went to see the Harlem Globetrotters play when they came here for an exhibition match.”

With the seed sown, Rogers went back and helped introduce the sport back at his school.

As an avid reader himself, Rogers was a member of the American library in Harare, which was affiliated to Young Men Christian Association. It is the same organisation that put him in the path of former Finance Minister Herbert Murerwa.

“In 1969, while at YMCA, I met Herbert Murerwa and he helped me and my colleagues — Dudley Gibbs, Kimon and Gerry Raftopolous and Anthony Tony Greenland — to form a basketball team.

“This team later went on to become the first black league team in the country and recorded league success, both as YMCA and later Arcadia Bucs, when the name-change occurred in 1975.”

His defining moment would come soon after Independence when he had his inaugu

ral tour as the first captain of the Zimbabwe national team.

“I captained Zimbabwe against Mozambique and Kenya after Independence and retired from playing at the end of the 1980/81 season.

“I think it was sometime in April 1980, at the age of 34. All the Bucs founding fathers had already retired.

“By that time I had been elected as vice chairman of Mashonaland (1977) and was now serving as the secretary-general of BUZ (1979) while still playing,” he said.

Three days after his retirement in 1980, Rogers wrote to FIBA to re-instate Zimbabwe into the international basketball community. “I wrote to FIBA to have our suspension lifted and they replied almost immediately.

“We were then invited, together with my then-chairman Alan Bruce-Brand, to attend the international congress in Moscow at the 1980 Olympics.

“Alan and I hitched a lift with the Zimbabwe Olympic team as they were also invited to the games for the first time since 1960.

“We received a warm welcome at the conference, which was attended by over 100 countries, and also had the privilege of watching top basketball games and our Hockey Golden Girls win their medal.”

After the trip, Rogers was then co-opted into ZOC as secretary-general until 2001.

While at ZOC, Rogers performed the roles of deputy team manager and team manager.

He has also been a delegate at seven Olympics, four Commonwealth Games and three All-Africa Games.

At the 1995 All-Africa Games hosted by Zimbabwe, he was team manager of what remains the largest contingent to represent the country, with over 250 athletes and officials.

Three years later, at the 1998 Kuala Lumpur Games, he was elected as vice president for Africa on the Commonwealth Games Federation until 2004 when he relocated to the UK at the end of the Athens Olympics.

Rogers has now settled into life away from the hustle and bustle of sport and is father to three boys — Cyprus, Lucas and Edgar Junior. He also spoke of the coronavirus pandemic. “Life has been hard for everyone, what with the coronavirus, and I spend most of my days reading.

“I am an avid reader from my school days and most recently have taken to reading some of the books on the late great Nelson Mandela.

“I do try my best to keep track of the basketball scene back home and will be looking at ways to help resurrect Arcadia Bucs.

“I hear some work is being done to help revitalise the courts, so that is an area we might look into,” said Rogers.