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Buffalo Flats Sports Award
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Speeches and Media Releases
 Premier's Office

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EASTERN CAPE PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT

SPEECH BY THE PREMIER, REV MA STOFIILE

AT THE BUFFALO FLATS SPORTS AWARDS

ON 30 OCTOBER 99

The best ambassadors of any country are its sportpersons. Through individual participants or the teams, a country is able to reflect who 
they are in that country. Through Sports, a country is also able to measure the state of its health and discipline. Above all, sport 
continues to project the values of a country. As such, events like this one are very important activities and must be encouraged.

At the home/local front, sports achievers act as mentors for future generations of sportspersons. They motivate youngsters in the right 
direction and keep their energies positively engaged. This way, sport is also very important as a deterrent against criminality. But such 
energies cannot be harnessed properly without the dedicated and selfless effort of organisers and administrators. These are the people who 
produce the performers, the achievers; and they also prepare the facilities (or find them where they dont exist). We congratulate such 
organisers and administrators that made to nights events possible. Being people from Buffalo Flats and the surrounding areas, I know you 
took from nothing and produce something.

Well done. But those who know the kind the brilliant sportspersons this area produced, despite apartheid, are not surprised that you were 
able and motivated to organise such an event.

In 1991 I was asked by our friends in New Zealand.

"How soon do you think it will take South Africa to have fully representative teams? "

I answered: "Five years at the earliest. That will depend on us embarking on a vigorous development programme for people from 
underprivileged communities (players and administrators)."

I was condemned and disowned for that statement even by people who are my close comrades. They saw the statement as being pessimistic and 
unhelpful. Both labels were wrong. Eight years down the line South Africa has still not been able to produce representative sides both at 
the Provincial and national levels. History has vindicated me again.

Despite the formal and constitutional mergers since 1992, our sport continues to reflect the imbalances of the past. Although one or two 
individuals from Black communities get paraded from time to time as having made a break through, the naked truth is that such individuals 
had made the breakthrough anyway when they attended privileged schools and institutions. As such they had become part of the privileged 
communities rather that the underprivileged ones. They only come back to have holidays with our communities or to sleep at home after a 
whole day away from that community.

Whilst we encourage such lucky individuals to do their best and succeed, we cannot accept some of their statements that they represent a 
breakthrough by our communities. They do not. And we plead with them not to comment on subjects they do not understand.

CAUSES FOR THE PROBLEM

It is common cause that the legacy of many decades of apartheid is still very much in our midst. We continue to live in Group Areas. 
Facilities, and amenities are still unequal. The economy continues to be dominated by a few white hands. Poverty and affluence continue to 
be associated with Blacks are still seen as "outsiders" who are being accommodated in lower "development" teams. We remain there until we 
retire.

We would be guilty of inaccuracy if we said that all sports officials, unions and Federations behave in this way. There are very small 
minorities who are trying hard. But by and large sport continues to be used as a last bastion of the " Cultural Mlungustan." To make 
matters worse now, all sport is run on professional basis. Development of the poor is again left to the poor themselves. The result of this 
must be clear to all-Only those who have and are lucky will be able to make progress. Not those who can.

In the light of this situation where facilities and resources are not equally accessible to citizens of the same locality and country, it 
is mischievous to talk about merit selection. How can merit be a criterion where opportunities are not equal?

SOLUTION (POSSIBLE)

Those who fought for a non-racial country and non-racial sport must not be confused and must not be demoralised. New perks and 
possibilities to advance our own selves should not blind us to what is to be done. Let us go back to the basics.

In 1992 we clearly spelt out the terms of unity in sport. We also spelt out the priorities of the uniting process. International games was 
never a priority. It was to be a product of what progress we achieve in intergrating sport in this county. We were guided by the clear 
understanding that if we simply opened the international competitions gate, those who ALWAYS masqueraded as the representatives of our 
country will continue on their classical/historical ways. We were right. History is our writness. The world is our witness. Some countries 
are asking: "what happened to the "New South Africa? This is an embarrassing question.

In September 1992 we proposed 5X5 quotas for all South Africa Ruby Teams, except the national XV. This was a compromise position. It was 
accepted by SARFU but never implemented. In 1996 a Sunday Times reporter who had become SARFUs PRO also supported this view (without 
acknowledging where he got it from) (for he had? it whilst working for the Sunday Times. A lot of feathers were ruffled recently on this 
very issue of quotas. Indeed many codes are discussing it. Only the future will determine the level of our resolve to do something about 
the imbalances.

One thing is sure, our children cannot be subjected to the old apartheid stereotypes: White is best and Black is spectator. We have to 
change that. We owe it to those who lost their everything fighting for a non-racial South Africa.

The starting point, of course, is the grassroots. Unless a broad base of talent is established, talent scouting and development will be 
skewed and problematic. Buffalo Flats is doing it the right way. From Buffalo Flats to East London, to the Border, South Africa and the 
World. That is how it should be done if the Apex of the Triangle is to be comfortable at the top. This is the approach we are prepared to 
support. Not a few elite at the top who did not compete with all-comers on equal terms at the bottom.

We cannot support a few who MAY as opposed to those who CAN. Sport is about those who can and are willing. Then it becomes a true 
reflection of society, as it should be.

Congratulations to the award  receivers and the organisers. To the rest of the sporting fraternity:

We must never, never, never give up

Thanks

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