Also goalkeeper Kodjovi Obilale Dodo was hit in the stomach and had to be flown to South Africa for a hopefully life-saving operation. Defender Serge Akakpo, who plays in Romania, was hit by two bullets and lost a great deal of blood while reserve keeper Obilale, from GSI Pontivy in France was also wounded,
Keep politics out of sport. I normally heard this cry when the Springboks wanted to tour Britain, or some bunch of over-the-hill cricket mercenaries wanted to earn many times their 30 pieces of Silver playing in a rebel tour.
But much of the time sportsmen don’t even have a say, or any opportunity to voice their opinion. It is their employers, paymasters, governing bodies and just as often the governments that put them into that position. And it is nothing new.
Did players from most of the top European nations really not want to travel to Uruguay in 1930 – and surely the Uruguayan players wanted the opportunity to defend their title in Mussolini’s Italy four years later. Though perhaps it was just as well, they stayed at home. FIFA’s blind eyes kept their gaze well away from, the three top Argentinian players now playing for Italy, also the “strange” refereeing decisions that handed victory to Italy over Spain in the quarter final. Il Duce’s “friend” Mr Ivan Eklind even the headed the ball to an Italian player in the semi. He was demoted by the Swedish FA for his performances, following his return, but had still been picked to handle the final.
After Hitler had turned Germany into a one-party state, debate raged over US participation in the 36 Olympics, they traditionally sent one of the largest teams to the Games. By the end of 1934, the lines were clearly drawn. US Olympic Committee head Avery Brundage opposed a boycott, arguing that politics had no place in sport. “The Olympic Games belong to the athletes and not to the politicians.” In 1935, Brundage alleged the existence of a “Jewish-Communist conspiracy” to keep the United States out of the Games. Ernest Lee Jahncke, a former assistant secretary of the Navy, of German Protestant descent, was expelled from the IOC in July 1936 after taking a strong public stand against the Berlin Games. The IOC pointedly elected Avery Brundage to fill Jahncke's seat. Jahncke is the only member in the 100-year history of the IOC to be ejected.
In May 1938, England’s footballers were ordered by the Foreign Office and FA to give the Nazi salute before the friendly with Germany. It was a piece of contemptible cringing aimed at supporting conservative Neville Chamberlain’s policy of appeasement, and was all the more craven as Hitler who was well known to hate sport, didn't bother to turn up. The image of impressionable and powerless footballers obeying orders from unthinking bureaucrats and politicians that was seen round the world should be of lasting shame to this country. Being just weeks after Hitler had annexed Austria and at a time when the Nazi plans for “the Final Solution” were being laid.
Which gave Hitler more respectability? That salute or the unwillingness of sport's decision makers to deny Hitler a massive propaganda victory? They turned up with hardly a word of protest for the Berlin Olympics two years before. All the praise heaped on Jesse Owens’ success was very much a re-writing of history, in fact the German public showed far greater appreciation of his achievements than the US authorities ever would.
One wonders if Basil D’Olivera had not been in the England team whe
ther cricket would ever have managed a stand against the PW Bothe’s Bokke regime. “Keep Politics out of sport” we were told when the subject of Apartheid and Rugby came up. Funny, didn’t hear too much of that when Thatcher wanted UK athletes to Boycott the Moscow Olympics. The reason? Well the Soviet Union had invaded Afghanistan on the pretext that they were worried about Muslim extremists who had taken over the puppet government and there was a threat of terrorism within the USSR’s borders, sound familiar anyone?Who decided that Angola a country riven with civil war for 20 years was a suitable place to stage the Africa Cup of Nations? Who approved the selection of the enclave of Cabinda as a venue?
A region physically and ethnically not part of Angola,– or was it a political decision regarding an area that seeks autonomy. Conservative estimates are that Cabinda produces around 60% of Angola’s oil – so no politics in that decision then.
Three innocent people have lost their lives and three more injured with many more having been put at risk – perhaps it is the politicians that we need to keep out of sport.
