Archbishop blows the whistle
2003-11-24 19:01
Johannesburg - An urgent meeting involving top national rugby bosses and Sports Minister Ngconde Balfour will most likely take place on Wednesday, the sports ministry said on Monday.
Balfour called for an urgent meeting with the rugby bosses on Sunday after extraordinary details of a training camp the Springboks had been subjected to before the World Cup became public.
Newspapers have been reporting since last week that the players attended a training camp where they were stripped naked, deprived of sleep and food.
The team was further ordered into a lake to pump up rugby balls underwater while guns were pointed at them.
The ignominy was compounded on Monday with newspapers running a picture of the Boks, with exposed backsides, crawling through the veld.
The camp took place as part of the preparations of the Springboks for the tournament which they crashed out of in Australia.
Graham Abrahams, the spokesman for Balfour, said on Monday that all the rugby administrators and the minister were still in Australia, and had not yet returned to South Africa.
"All of them are not in the country," Abrahams said. The meeting would "most likely take place on Wednesday."
Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon added his voice to the call that the people who were in charge of the training camp should apologise to the nation, the players and supporters.
An angry Anglican Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane on Sunday called on the SA World Cup management to apologise to the nation and to a much loved rugby team.
Jackboot tactics
"You don't motivate people with jackboot tactics and the proof is certainly in the World Cup pudding. I am not surprised our boys in green did so badly in Australia," he said.
On Monday, Leon said: "No South African and no Springbok supporter can be proud of the apparent activities at Kamp Staaldraad.
"To date, rugby's top officials have tried to justify the bizarre preparations used. They should stop trying to defend the indefensible," he said at the opening of a Tygerberg LMC election office.
Leon took the opportunity to accuse Balfour and the African National Congress of using the incident as its leverage over rugby.
"Now Minister of Sport Ngconde Balfour is climbing on the bandwagon, using Kamp Staaldraad as a tool to increase his leverage over the sport.
"Now the ANC is using the hearings into racism in rugby to try to extend its control over the sport and to score political points.
"The ANC is not motivated by the desire to improve the career fortunes of black players, nor by the desire to make our rugby teams better, but by the desire to increase its control over sport, in line with its agenda of expanding its power into every sphere of society," Leon said.
The ANC could not be reached for comment.
- SAPA