Rugby is a symbol of South Africa’s real but uneven racial progress
Save time by listening to our audio articles as you multitaskNot that anyone is on the streets. They are all in Faure stadium, watching school bands crank out fight songs for rows of pupils to bellow in unison, a scene that suggests Italian football “ultras” conducting a glee club. Then come the cheerleaders, parachutists billowing with school colours and, finally, a rugby match . The vibe is reminiscent of high-school football in the American South.
Black South Africans rallied to the team; Mandela was praised by Afrikaners who once deemed him a terrorist. “This was one of the final blows to exclusive right-wing Afrikaner nationalism,” wrote Frederik van Zyl Slabbert, a politician and academic, after the final. “I saw and heard one of the pot-bellied brigade whisper through his tears: ‘That is my president’.”
“Eastern Cape is the mecca of black rugby,” affirms Zola Yeye, who played for township teams and later joined the Springboks’ coaching staff. Whenvisited, Mr Yeye had invited Mr Ludwaba and another rugby legend, Lucky Mange, to his butchery in New Brighton, a township on the outskirts of Port Elizabeth. Out back, meat roasted on an open fire; photos of the men’s playing days were on display out front.
These days the stadium is dilapidated. On a recent Friday the field was overgrown and strewn with weeds. The changing rooms had been ransacked. Truant teenagers lined the pockmarked concrete stands, getting drunk and smoking drugs. When Rassie Erasmus became coach of the Springboks in 2018 he talked openly with the squad about how their team had to look like the rest of South Africa. Yet he stressed that there was enough talent, recalls Mr Kolisi, “for us to be competitive and transformed all at once”. He would showcase equality of opportunity, not diversity for diversity’s sake.
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