In salute to the modern-day Anglo-Boer War
The mood across the country was so ironic to what transpired during Apartheid, that the townships chanted “Bokke! Bokke!” into the wee hours of the morning.
A tongue-in-cheek commentary by Johnny Masilela:
Ahead of and after the Springboks stunned a stubborn English side during the semi-finals of the Rugby World Cup, the country was alive with drama.
The rugby showdown, billed as one of the finest in the modern-day game, had creative juices flowing through the platform of social media, shebeens, bars, and most probably places of worship.
Following the Springboks’ 16-15 triumph over England, there has been a joke doing the rounds that the result proved beyond reasonable doubt that Mandela is a greater ancestor comparable to the late Queen Elizabeth.
In Bela-Bela and elsewhere around the Waterberg, township folk unanimously declared South Africa’s match-up with the England team was the reincarnation of the historic Anglo-Boer War.
Wow! General de la Rey — and perhaps even Eugène Terreblanche — must be turning in their graves.
For a proper perspective of this kind of Boer humor from the mainly black community, we need to rewind back to the old days of skop, skiet en donder. The days of jackboot Apartheid, that is.
During those days the Springboks and other sporting codes suffered under what was known as the sports embargo, meaning national and club teams from South Africa were barred from competing with their international counterparts.
Traveling down memory lane, one remembers how the National Party’s Committee for Fairness in Sport — chaired by black sports journalist Leslie Sehume — tried to counter the sports boycott.
One also remembers when the Springboks played in what was termed as rebel tours when we blacks used to watch the match-ups on the Afrikaans-language TV1.
Whenever the Springboks lost these fixtures, the townships would explode joyfully because we thought our oppressor had been sjambokked.
Boxers such as Kallie “Die Boomstraat Bek” Knoetze were not spared.
When the former policeman was floored by American Big John Tate, the townships and villages were in a celebration mood, too.
Then in 1995, Nelson Mandela stood next to Springbok captain Francois Pienaar, lifting the World Cup trophy aloft.
The mood across the country was so ironic to what transpired during Apartheid, that the townships chanted “Bokke! Bokke!” into the wee hours of the morning.
It was around this time that newspapers nicknamed the Springboks Amabokoboko.
Fast forward to present-day South Africa, whenever we meet England in any sporting code whatsoever, it will be like the Anglo-Boer War is back with us again.
- Johnny Masilela is a writer and novelist from Bela-Bela.
