KRISH MACKERDHUJ - A STRUGGLE HERO WHO STOOD UP
AGAINST RACISM IN SPORT AND SOCIETY IN GENERAL IN SOUTH AFRICA
BY SUBRY GOVENDER
INTRO: At a time when South
Africans are enjoying the full benefits of international sport, it’s
appropriate to recall the struggles of our sporting administrators who made
this possible. Veteran journalist - Subry Govender – contends in our ongoing
series on Struggle Heroes and Heroines that the role played by non-racial
sports administrators was a vital element in the broader struggles for the
creation of a non-racial and democratic South Africa. One of the leaders was
Krish Mackerdhuj, the former president of the non-racial South African Cricket
Board, who passed on, on May 26 2004.
It was a period in the 1980s
when white cricket at that time was feeling the full impact of the isolation of
South African sport that Krish Mackerdhuj, who was president of the non-racial
South African Cricket Board(SACB), came to the fore. He and his fellow
anti-apartheid sports administrators were taken aback by moves by a former
captain of the whites-only national cricket team, Ali Bacher, to lure the
former West Indian cricket great, Clive Lloyd, to visit South Africa to
intervene between white and non-racial cricket administrators. Bacher was the
CEO of white cricket at this time and he was busy preparing rebel tours to
break the international isolation of white cricket. This isolation was led by
all the former colonised countries such as India, West Indies, Pakistan and Sri
Lanka. The other cricket-playing countries such as England, Australia and New
Zealand only joined the boycott of South Africa at a later stage. Clive Lloyd,
also a former captain of the great West Indies team, who was not fully aware of
the socio-political-economic situation in South Africa, agreed to come to the
country to speak to all cricket administrators. But Mackerdhuj and his fellow
non-racial officials were totally opposed to Lloyd visiting South
Africa at a time when the white minority was still in control of the country.
(Krish Mackerdhuj attending a
workshop at the Sastri College Hall in Durban in the 1980s when the struggles
against apartheid sport were at its height.) They had adopted the policy
of “no normal sport in an abnormal country”, a vision of Mr Hassan Howa, who
was president of the South African Cricket Board of Control (SACBC) in the late
1970s. The opposition by Mackerdhuj and his officials was fully supported by
the South African Council of Sport(SACOS), the United Democratic Front(UDF),
the South African Non-Racial Olympic Committee(SANROC), which was based in
London; and the ANC in exile. I spoke to Mackerdhuj about their attitude to
Clive Lloyd’s proposed visit. He outlined that they respected the West Indian
great as a cricketer but they as South Africans knew when international
isolation of South African sport should be lifted. This is what Mackerdhuj had
told me in an interview at that time: “We have the utmost respect for Clive
Lloyd as West Indies captain and his efficiency and ability in cricket. The
system here would use him without any strings attached. They will go out of
their way to use him and that’s why people like Ali Bacher jumped to issue an
invitation to him. “By Lloyd coming here he would embarrass us. He must have
nothing to do with them. Change must come from within the country. People who
sit to talk must talk on an equal basis. There can’t be a master-slave
relationship. There can’t be a privileged person sitting with an
under-privileged person.” Mr Mackerdhuj, who in the early 1990s became the
first president of the new United Cricket Board of South Africa, was just one
of the hundreds of non-racial sports administrators who used sport to further
the struggles for a non-racial, just and democratic new South Africa. The
others included such luminaries as M N Pather, who was the secretary general of
the non-racial tennis union and SACOS; Don Kali, who was involved in the tennis
union; Mr Morgan Naidoo, who was leader of the non-racial swimming union; Mr
Norman Middleton, who was leader of the non-racial South African Soccer
Federation; Paul David, who was involved in the Natal Cricket Board and the
Natal Council of Sport (NACOS)and Mr Hassan Howa.
(Krish Mackerdhuj with Nelson
Mandela at a cricket match in the early days of the new South Africa.)
There were others such as Mr
Cassim Bassa, who was involved in table tennis, Mr Ramhori Lutchman, Dharam
Ramlall, S K Chetty and Mr R K Naidoo of the South African Soccer Federation
Professional League; and Mr Pat Naidoo and Harold Samuels of the Natal Cricket
Board. Mr Mackerdhuj in that interview in the early 1980s expressed the views
of his fellow anti-apartheid sports administrators when he had said that
“normal sport” could only be played and enjoyed once the country’s people were
also politically free. This is what he had told me: “You can’t have
discrimination in some fields and no discrimination in others. This is our
fight in sport. You can’t say there’s going to be no discrimination in sport
and yet we have discrimination in other aspects of our lives. We have made it
clear what we stand for, I don’t think the other side have made it clear what
they stand for. “And these people you know recently came out with a declaration
of intent and Ali Bacher was one of them. The Declaration was that they were preparing
for non-racialism in sport. “We say the declaration of intent by any sane
thinking person with interest in non-racial democracy in South Africa should be
against detentions without trial, against the unjust laws in the country,
against discriminatory education, against influx control, against the
activities of the police and defence forces in the townships. That’s the kind
of declaration that must come out of people who are interested in a future
non-racial and democratic South Africa.”
POLITICALLY CONSCIOUS
Mackerdhuj, who was born in
Durban in August 1939, had become politically-conscious after he matriculated
at Sastri College and studied at Fort Hare University in the Eastern Cape for
his BSC degree from 1958 to 1963. While at Fort Hare he joined the ANC but this
open involvement was shattered when the ANC and PAC were banned in 1960. He
told me that when he returned home in 1963 and joined Shell and BP as a
technologist, he had decided to use sport to further the cause of the ANC in
the struggles for a non-racial and democratic society. Although he was active
in soccer and table tennis, he had decided to concentrate on cricket, both as a
player and administrator. He joined the Crimson Cricket Club and thereafter
promoted the cause of non-racial sport through the Durban and District Cricket
Union, the Natal Cricket Board, the South African Cricket Board of Control and
later the United Cricket Board(UCB). In the ongoing struggles for a non-racial
and democratic society, he served the NCB as president for eight years from
1976-1984; president of SACBOC from 1984 to 1990; the South African Council of
Sport(SACOS) since its inception in 1970s and the Natal Council of Sport
(NACOS) as a founding member and president. In the struggles to isolate apartheid
South Africa, Mackerdhuj, after being denied a passport on several occasions,
travelled to London in 1987 to attend a meeting of the International Cricket
Council(ICC). Here he campaigned successfully with the help of Sam Ramsamy of
SANROC for South Africa to be banned from international cricket until apartheid
was abolished and the disenfranchised people people in South Africa attained
their political, social and economic freedom.
MACKERDHUJ AT LORDS IN LONDON
Mackerdhuj travelled to Lords
in London again in 1989 to present a petition to the ICC against the rebel tour
to South Africa by England’s Mike Gatting and his team. After the establishment
of a united cricket body following the release of Nelson Mandela and the
unbanning of the ANC in February 1990, Mackerdhuj served as deputy president of
the UCB for one year from 1992 to 1993 and as president from 1993 to 1997.
Mackerdhuj stepped down from the UCB in 1997 after he was appointed by
President Nelson Mandela to serve as Ambassador to Japan. He served South
Africa in this position for five years. During one of his visits back home at
this period, I again interviewed Mackerdhuj while I was working as a senior
political journalist at the SABC.
"MY NEW ROLE AFTER
FREEDOM"
He had told me that throughout
his life he had served the country and the ANC by campaigning for a non-racial
democracy through the medium of sport. “I am now happy to serve my country in a
new role after we have attained our freedom. We have a long road to travel
because we have to continue to work in all spheres to promote a better life for
all people. “We will have to be prepared to overcome many hurdles because the
road ahead will not be easy.” In the new South Africa, Mackerdhuj was presented
with a number of awards for his contributions to the struggles. These included
the State President’s Award for Sports Administration by President Nelson
Mandela in 1994; the Sports Administrator of the Year award in 1993 and 1994 by
the Natal Sportswriters Guild; and life member of London’s Marleybone Cricket
Club(MCC) in 1996. Mackerdhuj passed on, on the 26th of May 2004 at the age of
65. The role played by Mackerdhuj and others such as M N Pather, Morgan Naidoo,
Hassan Howa and George Singh should not be forgotten. But, unfortunately, 23
years into our new non-racist society, the contributions by activists of the
calibre of Mackerdhuj seems to have been trampled on by the return of racism in
many disguised forms. What a shame? What a sad commentary of the state of
affairs? Ends – subrygovender@gmail.com
