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SOKWANELE
Enough
is Enough
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fundamental right to freedom of expression!
Sokwanele
Reporter
12 May 2004
The brave decision of Stuart
MacGill, the Australian leg-spinner, on moral grounds not to make himself
available for the cricket tour to Zimbabwe, is to be warmly applauded. MacGill
said he could not tour Zimbabwe “and maintain a conscience” in the light of the
gross human rights’ abuses perpetrated under Robert Mugabe’s rule. Australian
commentators say this is the first time in the modern era an Australian
cricketer has refused to tour on moral grounds.
Both the Australian Prime Minister and Foreign Minister have shown their
appreciation of the cricketer’s courageous stand, obviously taken at some
personal cost.
Also to be applauded in the tough
world of international sport in which the commercial factor is usually decisive
is the principled stand taken by Des Wilson.
Wilson has resigned from the management team of the England and Wales
Cricket Board (ECB) after failing to persuade his colleagues to take a firmer
line against the attitude of the International Cricket Council (ICC) towards
sport in Zimbabwe.
The position for which Wilson
lobbied strongly was that England should tour Zimbabwe in October and November
only under clear public protest, and that the ECB should start campaigning now
to change the ICC’s position on this issue.
To date the ICC has adopted a strong so-called “apolitical” stance,
maintaining that there is no linkage between international sport and politics.
In fact the ICC has gone further in introducing harsh financial penalties for
any national cricket board which dares to take a principled stand on the
issue. What the ICC fails to understand
of course is that the issue as it concerns Zimbabwe is not a matter of party
politics at all (the MDC against ZANU PF for instance), nor of idealism. The issue here transcends the normal
boundaries of politics. It concerns
rather a situation of desperate suffering in a nation afflicted by massive human
rights’ abuses. It is therefore
essentially a matter of good and evil – literally life and death - in a nation
under threat of death.
In support of his proposal that
the ECB should only tour Zimbabwe under protest, Des Wilson commented “In so
doing it would be seen to exercise both moral judgment and accountability to UK
political, public and stakeholder opinion and take a first step in rejecting the
unsustainable proposition that moral concerns have no place in sport”. Sadly he
found himself isolated not only on the ECB but at Lords where only the MCC
supported his argument in favour of adopting a moral
stance.
In passing it is interesting to
note the clear parallels between the position in which the ICC finds itself
today and the position of the major sporting bodies under apartheid-ruled South
Africa over a decade ago. The South
Africans’ experience taught them that there could be no normal sport in an
abnormal society. The ICC it seems, and
those who support their line, have to learn that lesson all over again, and they
appear set to learn it the hard way. The
most enthusiastic sporting authorities in South Africa eventually had to face
the truth that there are occasions when over-riding moral considerations
transcend the narrow interests of sport.
And sooner or later those who today think that Zimbabwean cricket can
continue as before irrespective of the end of the rule of law and the gross
human rights’ abuses perpetrated on a daily basis across the country, will have
to face the same hard truth.
What do Zimbabwe’s own cricketers
think of bringing moral concerns into the game? How many of them are prepared
make a sacrificial stand on a clear moral issue ?
Only last year two members of the
Zimbabwean team, Henry Olonga and Andy Flower, made a powerful political
statement by wearing black armbands as they took to the field in a World Cup
match in Harare – a protest, in their words, against “the death of democracy in
Zimbabwe”. A simple gesture which
expressed most eloquently what very many Zimbabweans were thinking. It was a brave stand which cost both players
their position in the Zimbabwean side, but it was widely applauded at the time
by many civic groups and those concerned with human rights. A group of church leaders in Bulawayo hailed
Olonga and Flower’s gesture as “hitting
a six for freedom and democracy”.
Moreover if only two members of
Zimbabwe’s squad were prepared to make a personal stand on a moral issue a year
ago, the position now is very different. The Mugabe regime’s move to take
control of ZCU through political appointments to the board and the
implementation of a clear political agenda in the selection process (in line
with the infamous Dr Zechariah’s document) has now brought out 15 players
effectively on strike. Dissatisfaction among the players had been mounting for a
long time over the composition of the board (specifically the inclusion of
members with questionable cricketing credentials) and what the players perceived
as a clear racial, and even regional, bias in the selection of the team. These concerns, elaborated in Heath Streak’s
statement to the press, made it clear that however the ZCU tried to portray the
white players it was not so much the players as the ZCU itself which was guilty
of serious racial bias. Eventually it was their decision to sack
Heath Streak as captain which tipped the scales and brought all 15 players out
in protest. The non-white players then
received phone calls from officials of the ZCU with known political connections,
warning them not to side with their white colleagues. Hondo, Nkala and Ebrahim who were going to
pull out received further threats to ensure their
compliance.
An increasing number of the
Zimbabwean players therefore have demonstrated their willingness to act on
principle even at considerable personal cost.
The truth has been borne in upon them through their own brave stand that
there can be no normal sport in an abnormal society. The question which remains at this point is
when those responsible for organizing the Australian and English tours of
Zimbabwe will stumble upon the same truth.
And whatever the final decision in respect of those tours, the bigger
question is when the people of Zimbabwe as a whole will acknowledge this
reality. Accepting this fundamental
truth surely requires Zimbabweans, black and white and of all political
persuasions, to boycott all such international fixtures en masse.
Ends
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