APARTHEID SPORT ISSUE Africa’s battle with N.Z. “fierce: but end is sure”

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34138, 27 April 1976, Page 29

APARTHEID SPORT ISSUE Africa’s battle with N.Z. “fierce: but end is sure”

New Zealand Press Association)

AUCKLAND. Without positively confirming his statement in March that African nations, in the event of the All Blacks touring South Africa, will boycott the Olympic Games unless New Zealand’s entry is refused, the president of the Supreme Council of Sport in Africa, Mr Abraham Ordia, now declares: “The battle will be fierce; it may be long: but the end is sure."

In a Ion? letter from Lagos. Nigeria, to the ; New Zealand “Herald” sports writer, T. P. MeLean. Mr Ordia contends t hat New Zealand is out of touch with reality in embracing a policv of ' support for apartheid sport.

“Let the National Party' demonstrate, not only by words, but also by actions, its condemnation of aparthied in sport,” Mr Ordia writes, “and we shall all be friends again. “Failing this, the struggle continues to the bitter end.” Mr Ordia says that New Zealand was very much in the news in Nigeria after

the publication in mid-Marchf of his threat of an Olympic] boycott. “Our 17 dailies,” Mr Ordia j writes, “carried the news i and the statement credited] to the New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs. "He was i reported as saying that I misunderstand New Zealand policy on apartheid. “How I wished he knew how people reacted to his statement. You don’t defend yourself by asking the judge about others who commit the same offence.” Mr Ordia, in explaining that he had been away from Lagos for nearly a ’month while visiting East Africa, said that he had been “genuinely amazed” at the scores and scores of letters from New Zealand which awaited him on his return.

Some obscene Eightly per cent of the ■letters were, he added I anonymous. Several were I abusive and despicable, and i some even obscene and too bad for words from a “civ-' ■ilised” country. Some, however, were quite objective and charitable. i “The writers do not seem, Ito know,” says Mr Ordia, “That I represent a Continent of 48 independent African nations. “Whereas I concede that the writers are by no means among your best intellectuals, I must say that all of them considered together clearly suggest a nonrecognition of the realities of the hour.” From reading of New Zealand and world newspapers, and of New Zealand Hansard, Mr Ordia said that he had come to believe no 'Commonwealth or other fcountry spent so much time debating in Parliament on ‘sporting ties or otherwise with aparthied South Africa and Rhodesia. i Called ‘"hyprocrisy” I “Some of your people say i they aeplore apartheid,” Mr lOrdia remarks. “How can !you deplore a thing and yet Iferventlv vote to play with lit?

' “We would call that hyjprocrisy. Truths don’t cease ;to be truths because we refuse to admit them. I shall 'not dissipate time and ' | energy arguing with your pro-apartheid elements. ■ "We shall speak to them I in the language they understand. We concede to the New Zealand National Party, ■ just as we concede to Mr John Vorster’s Nationalist I Party in South Africa, its ' right of action. “We expect both to concede to us our right of reaction. i “Ask the 80-million peoy ; [ of Nigeria, ask everyone else on this continent, they will . tell you that New Zealand is 5 the last-ditch supporter of , South African apartheid j sport.

Shared reaction “Ask all the Blacks of the United States, the West] Indies, Central and South America, ask Asia and your I Pacific neighbours, they’will all give the same answer. ' “Ask the Blacks of South 'Africa and Rhodesia, they 'make no mistake about it. "Even the whites in South Africa and Rhodesia admitted that only total isolation could bring about changes in the aparthied sports policies in their countries,” Mr Ordia contends. The United Nations Special Committee on Apartheid had called to question the activities of New Zealand, more than those of any other country, in this regard. “The Prime Minister, Mr Muldoon, is reported to have said that ‘time will tell’ when asked to comment on my first statement,” Mr Ordia says. “I agree entirely with him. The battle will be fierce, it may be long: but the end is sure. “For let truth and false hood grapple, whoever knew truth to be worsted in such an encounter?

No Govt support

“It may be true — and I admit that some countries still permit their sporting teams to play with racist South Africa. You will find that, unlike New Zealand, I the Governments of most of 'these countries do not lend ; support to the sports teams who do so.

“In any case, such contacts are of far less significance and the number of countries is now very small. The tours are often largely conducted with the minimum of publicity. "One should sympathise rather than be angry with New Zealand and her policy of support for apartheid sport. She is so detached from the rest of the world and, consequently, appears to be out of touch with reality.

“She has not got many missions abroad. I don’t know any of her embassies in Black Africa, This is one of her problems.”

Mr Ordia has called an extraordinary meeting of the executive committee of the Supreme Council of African Sport and this is to be held in Nairobi next week.