Issued by: The Office of the Executive Deputy President: Mr T Mbeki
5 March 1998
The National Youth Commission is extremely disturbed and disappointed by allegations brought to its attention of ugly racist comments made by SA cricketer Pat Symcox to a young South African cricket fan of Indian ethnicity who had approached him for an autograph.
Without having had access to all the facts, we will note and respect UCB managing director Dr Ali Bacher's call not to prejudge the situation, but we have an unavoidable responsibility to make the following general points:
1 Members of national sports teams represent the entire country, not just one sector of our population and have an unavoidable responsibility to act accordingly and alternatively, the choice of declining the honour of wearing national colours;
2 There is no amount of verbal provocation that justifies an adult national-level sportsman venting rage at young fans and particularly not in racist fashion;
3 Young South Africans have a reasonable expectation of courtesy from the sports stars they ardently follow and support without having to run the risk of being psychologically assaulted for their efforts;
4 Whether they like it or not our sports stars are viewed as role models by youth across the fullest range of social categories in our country and their right to do as they wish should be tempered by the responsibility of representing our country;
5. We trust that patterned boorish and prejudiced behaviour on the parts of national sports team members are not being systematically swept under the carpet - as is increasingly being alleged - in order to protect the image of sporting codes which would be better served by taking the public into their confidence with regard to the continued persistence of such rot.
The NYC calls on the UCB to help the public understand why so many people simply seem to view the alleged incident in age-old South African terms of a young black South African being the victim of a white bully. If there are indeed "two sides to this story" as Dr Bacher has said, then it is in the interests of the public, the UCB and Symcox himself that we be allowed to hear the other.
For further enquiries please contact NYC Acting Chief Executive Officer Paul Johnson on Cell 082 771 8465