AP
Siya Kolisi made his Springbok debut against Scotland in Nelspruit.
It is difficult not to sometimes get despondent about the quarrels we still have around race. This is bound to get worse, the closer we get to next year’s election.
It feels as if we haven’t made much progress during the past 20 years when one observes the bigoted attitudes of sections of the white community and the growing view among some black people that they have licence to publicly insult whites without sanction. But then, occasionally, something happens that reminds one that the project that Nelson Mandela had started more than two decades ago did not actually fail.
That, despite the discordant noises we hear every day, we have actually made significant progress as a people to accept that we’re in this thing together and should make it work.
Saturday’s Test match between the Springboks and Scotland at the Mbombela Stadium was such an event for me.
I know it has been said that patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel, but on Saturday I felt the stirrings of a national pride and a reassurance that perhaps we’re going to be kind of okay. It started off with Springbok captain Jean de Villiers declaring that they would play the Test in honour of the ailing Mandela.
A huge sign and several smaller placards were shown with messages of love and support for Mandela – held up by rugby-loving white South Africans.
The national anthem was sung with great gusto. All of it, not just the “Die Stem” bit, as sometimes happens with a mainly white Afrikaans crowd.
But the moist-eye moment came when Arno Botha got injured a few minutes into the game and Siya Kolisi took to the field, his first Test as a Springbok. There was an almighty roar when he ran on, and this was in Mpumalanga, far from Cape Town where he plays his rugby.
Kolisi grew up in the Zwide township of Port Elizabeth where he was born 22 years ago – 1991, when we just started the negotiations process that brought us a settlement three years later. His circumstances were similar to those of millions of young black people in our townships: poor, unsafe, with little prospect of a great life.
But he was recruited to go to a good high school, where he quickly showed his athleticism and his brilliance with the rugby ball. He started playing Super 15 rugby for the Stormers only last year.
De Villiers shared a hotel room with him last week and spoke highly of his talent, attitude and personality. Kolisi flew his father to Mbombela (formerly Nelspruit) to watch him play for the first time. Kolisi was the shining star among a struggling Springbok pack.
It is clear that his teammates love and respect him by the way he was hugged and slapped on the back, as rugby players do when they try to show affection.
And, yes, he was the Man of the Match after just his first time of putting on the Bok jersey. Barring serious injury, he is bound to be a megastar in the years to come. Little boys will have his poster above their beds and pretend to be him when they play their under-11 matches, just as they did with Victor Matfield and Bryan Habana.
It wasn’t lost on me that Kolisi made his debut on June 15, the day before we remember the youth rising up in Soweto in 1976. I was there that day as a young reporter, about Kolisi’s age. I couldn’t then have imagined that I would write about a 22-year-old black national hero in 37 years’ time.
Sure, Saturday’s Test was just a fleeting moment, just a sports event. Millions of black youngsters will never get even close to the opportunities offered Kolisi.
Sure, the fact that white rugby fanatics adore a young black player doesn’t mean they have suddenly become progressive non-racial democrats. But the whole event and Kolisi’s role did represent a small promise, a reminder of our potential to normalise as a less fractured society. There can be a lot more Siya Kolisis in our future.
It was a bit of a Mandela moment.
The government didn’t create Saturday’s magic. The government didn’t pluck Kolisi out of a depressing township and give him a different future. Civil society did. We as citizens have far more power than we realise. We should stop blaming the government for all our problems.
We should change our mindset and manufacture a better future without (and despite) our government.
As Mandela faces his last days on Earth, we should remember the way he made us feel connected when he was our president.
* Max du Preez is an author and columnist.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Newspapers.
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