A Springboks team for a common heritage of all South Africans
As we celebrate of heritage month I believe it is time to think about our heritage and our history. History is an part of the social fabric of any nation. We do not choose our history but we do choose how we remember it and how we celebrate it. This choice builds the moral issues of the country moving forward. It moulds the the unity of a country.
In South Africa we have a very divisive and brutal past. The nature of this history of our land is an open wound which grapple to heal and comes to terms with. My assertion is that this will continue to be so as long as we embrace diversity in a way that is divisive. Certain groups seem to want to embrace their heritage even if it is to the emotional detriment of others. The UN declared Apartheid a crime against humanity, however the remains a segment of South Africa that holds the view that its important for them to embrace symbols of Apartheid like the old flag.
Nelson Mandela vision of a 'rainbow nation' was flawed from the beginning as the environment and epoch he conceptualized this vision in was not appropriate. It is important to unite this nation but the first administration the democratic era did this at the expense of Black people in general Africans in particular. To illustrate this let us take the South African rugby team the Springboks as a case study. Beside being the official name of the rugby team, the name Springboks has a history. According to South African military history the name originates from nickname given to the the South African soldiers during the first and second world wars. Their badge had a Springbok as its symbol with 'union is strength' as its motto.
Nelson Mandela understood that the Springboks as a national rugby team is a cardinal pillar of the Afrikaner heritage and history. Hence during the early years of our democracy Mandela fought for the name Springboks to remain as the name of the rugby team when many blacks saw it as a symbol of an atrocious past. He bend over backwards to preserve Afrikaner history and heritage without giving black people a stake in the rugby team. Some reason it was not important for the first administration to research the real history of the Springboks or even to benchmark with New Zealand on how to make a rugby team belong to the former oppressors and former oppressed.
There is no problem with the name Springboks, however the challenge how we remember it. My history lecturer Emile Coetzee detailed for me a side of the springbok's military history that we should embrace. During world war two it was the Springbok soldiers who assisted Emperor Haile Selassie I to liberate Ethiopia from the attempted colonization by Italy. Imagine that: a predominately white army freeing an African empire from a European would be coloniser. This the history of the Springboks we need to embrace and remember.
During the opening game of the 2019 Rugby World Cup I felt sorry for the Springboks as they held each other watching the All Blacks declaring war with their famous haka. This reignited my curiosity regarding the lack of a war cry by our rugby team when we have such a diverse heritage. I couldn't understand why as a matter of unifying the nation didn't Nelson Mandela commission the establishment of African war cry to make Africans feel that the Springboks equally belongs to them. New Zealand did this hence the indigenous people of New Zealand love the All Blacks as much the white population.
In my quest for knowledge I stumbled on a YouTube video titled Friday Story #2: Our Forgotten Springbok War Cry. This interesting video asserts that the Springboks performed the Zulu indlamu when playing against the All Blacks in 1921, 1928 and the famous 1937 victory. The indlamu was led Phillip Nel who captained the great 1937 Springbok team grew up near Zululand which meant that he was accustomed to Zulu culture and history. According to the researcher who did the video- the last the Springboks performed the Zulu indlamu was the last time they won a series in New Zealand and the last time they won against the Springboks in Auckland. Obviously the Apartheid regime would have nothing of the sort of a Zulu indlamu performed under their racial state.
Although I am not certain of the historical accuracy of the video it is a shame that after 25 years of democracy and many sports ministers no one has ever tried to get to the bottom of this history for the sake of nation building. The critical issue of the need of a war cry was last spoken of in 2007 by former Springbok coach Jake White prior to the 2007 Rugby World Cup. Again ironically that year we won the Rugby World Cup under Jake White.
Nelson Mandela was correct in saying sports has the power to unite people. However, unity is based on catering for the interests of everyone. As a nation we must ensure that we campaign and convince government to instruct SARU to bring back the Zulu indlamu. SARU itself needs to invest in introducing rugby to more African primary and high schools in order to enhance the available pool of quality players. S.A. Rugby needs to be sport that transcends colour and embraces our rich history that produced great warriors. This a way to build unity in a nation suffering from a divided past.
