Humour or racism? David Kekana on SABC last night... "This umlungu uyadlisa" or "the white man is making us lose"

THIS is the moment - all poorly-filmed 12 seconds of it - when SABC analyst David Kekana put his foot in his mouth on Thomas Mlambo's otherwise excellent Monday night show SoccerZone.


The sound ain't great. But here's what happened. Asked about whether he preferred Kaizer Chiefs goalkeeper Brilliant Khuzwayo or Belgium-based Darren Keet to play in goal for South Africa during the AFCON 2015 tournament, Kekana made no bones about it. He said he preferred Itumeleng Khune's 24-year-old stand-in at the AmaKhosi and said: "This mlungu uyadlisa" or "the white man is costing us" when referring to Cape Town-born Keet, .


I have no problem with the use of the word umlungu. This very morning my t-shirt was emblazoned with the word, which means "white guy" and Bafana Bafana captain Dean Furman knows when that word is chanted around the stadium, it is not used in a derogatory sense.

WHAT IT SAYS ON THE SHIRT: particularly
ugly example of the race group Mlungu

But linked with the idea that Keet is in someway inferior - so far he has barely put a foot (or a hand) wrong in the national jersey - it comes across as deeply offensive. And as my twitter followers immediately pointed out last night, RACIST.


I've looked up "uyasidlisa". On google, the confusing response in English was "Iranians" (go on, try it) but most suggest it means "helping us to lose" with the "uya" suggesting defeat and "sidlisa" his role in the side.Scelo Nciki (@scubkae1 on twitter) and many others helped me with that. 


Twitter on the whole blasted Kekana, not just for his utterance but for his on-screen performance generally, suggesting a lot of his "jokes" fall flat. When I retweeted some of those messages, Kekana stayed silent. The debate raged but generally the reaction was: Imagine if a white analyst had said: "The darkie is letting us down". Unthinkable.


Ultimately, that is the bottom-line. Using race to single a man out for criticism has long been a problem in South Africa.


The question is: in post-Aparthate South Africa how seriously should be take black racism against white folk, after those long years of pale oppression? Clearly white-on-black racism has always been the major problem. But are we now democratic enough to see both sides of this particularly ugly coin? After 21 years, I'd argue: It's time to stop judging on race, time to end the awful habit of declaring ANYTHING on the basis of skin colour.


Around 90% of the tweets agreed with me as we went to bed, only to wake up this morning with THESE tweets from @davidkekana:


"I was asked a comparative question about Keet and Khuzwayo I said he conceded 33 goals in 21 matches for club"


"In African terms someone with a white hue is referred to as Umlungu. Nothing racist about that."


"Well I am married to an Umlungu, so I get told every day when I walk the streets with my wife"


I pointed out that I know several white men who, though married across the colour-line, hold racist views. When I recommended a course in broadcasting, he responded: "Neil (sic) I have done media law and hold a bachelors degree. Please don't insult me."


I said no slight was intended and asked him to apologise, he responded: "To please you Neil?"


I said no, just to prove he was a decent bloke. That was followed by: "I did not judge him based on his colour! It's your interpretation and not a fact"


I pointed out that "umlungu" suggested he had immediately zoned in on to Keet's colour. Kekana, refusing to apologise or accept responsibility for his words, then tweeted: "Neil, I have better things to be concerned with than you. You are the list (sic) of my concern."


And then came the cracker. The response of all racists under fire: "Like all racist (sic) Neal has to point fingers. Does that sound like turning the wheel back to an era?"


By then Kekana was trending on South African twitter as the nation vented their feelings. You can read the tweets online now if you want. Some came to Kekana's defence, but most agreed: "Please apologise, it's the right thing to do". That is, in my view, still the dominant feeling.

Seconds ago, Kekana sent this: "I said Mlungu Oyadlisa, cause he conceded 33 goals in 21 games in Belgium. Get your Zulu interpreter to interpret that."

As I write, there has been no response from the national broadcaster nor Thomas Mlambo, the presenter of SoccerZone and a man who I consider a friend. We did Euro2012 together. Mlambo, as you can see in the video footage, attempted to put a sock in Kekana's mouth as the incident unfolded and after the ad break, he came close to an apology for his colleague's sentiments.


But there has been no apology from Kekana. It's not like we are asking for a pint of blood. Just a simple sorry. If a white man were to say such things of a black player - particularly on the rugby or cricket channels - all hell would break loose.


With Bafana preparing to play Mali in their final friendly tomorrow - and Keet ready to play after a lightning-quick trip home to see his new-born son Leighton - this story may linger. But I hope not. All it would take is a quick "sorry" and we could leave this all behind.


But to ignore it, to let it go, would be WRONG. Racism is NOT ACCEPTABLE. Especially on SABC1, our national broadcasters' flag-ship channel.


Or perhaps I'm wrong and I've been WRONG all my life. Perhaps it's acceptable. Perhaps racism is still okay in South Africa. You tell me, David Kekana.


I left South Africa in 1985 because I just couldn't stand Aparthate any more. I was a young sports writer appalled by what I came across every day working in Umlazi and KwaMashu. I abhor racism, I was arrested and had my telephone bugged for dating a black woman in Durban. I returned to this country in 2010 to cover the World Cup... and came back to look after my elderly father... and because I thought we'd moved beyond the crude divide-and-rule politics of the Boer.


I didn't raise this topic, ordinary South Africans did, the minute they saw you say it. Ask them what you should do, David. We are all South Africans. We are equal. Darren Keet. Even me.



If Kekana, whom I have only met briefly, has a problem with any of this, he has my telephone number. I'd love to hear a reasonable response.

Basil D'Oliveira: Great knock Dolly, there'll never be another quite like you

Basil D'Oliveira. Cape Town docks, just after the Millennium, during England's disastrous cricket tour of 1999/2000 - you know, the one when "honest" Hansie Cronje engineered a result in Centurion after the Proteas had won the series.
And there he was. Dolly. My idol. The man who simply refused to accept he couldn't play Test cricket for his own country. Banned by the brutal Apartheid regime from becoming the world-famous all-rounder he so plainly was.
Forced to play for a "non-white" South Africa against Uganda and Kenya. Brought up on dusty township strips, but still a prodigious batter and a more than average bowler. He scored an estimated 80 tons on the rough matting wickets around the Cape before he was eventually allowed to play on grass.
Basil D'Oliveira, the cricketer BJ Vorster couldn't bowl over, the man who brought racism to the world's attention. Whose legacy led to the Peter Haine-led sporting isolation which ultimately resulted in ridiculous rebel tours, flour bombs at All Black Test matches and headlines around the world.
To my mind, as a sports journalist, one of the most valuable weapons in the battle against man's inhumanity to man. Apartheid. Aparthate. Great man, Dolly.
Our chat, with the gloriously bearded and now-deceased Mirror cricket writer Chris Lander, ranged from the mundane to the magnificent. Drinks were drunk. Dolly sparkled and shone. One of the great nights.
And now, at 80, the great man has died in England. Even back then, the first signs of Parkinson's Disease were apparent, though not dominant. They had a moment's silence at The Wanderers on day three of the second Test against Australia in his honour. He deserved black armbands, posters, television documentaries, the works. Perhaps they will follow.
Dolly's unique history cannot be written without reference to Apartheid. To his being classified "coloured" by a regime who put a pencil in your hair and a ruler down your nose to decide if you could vote or not. He was part India, part Portuguese, all African.
Born near Signal Hill in Cape Town on October 4, 1931 (though there are rumours he's actually three years older, making him a Test debutant at 39), Basil Lewis D'Oliveira was an all-round sportsman, not just a cricketing all-rounder. He played football and cricket for the "non-white" international sides but was shunned by the established white professional associations.
But enter John Arlott, the grand gentleman of cricket. He was the man credited with easing Dolly from St Augustine's Cricket Club to Middleton, a club playing in the Central Lancashire League in 1960, at a time when non-white emigration was rare and frowned upon by the National Party government.
Dolly wrote to Arlott, the voice of cricket  in the 60s and Arlott said later: “What opportunity was there for a cricketer, denied by the laws of his native country organised coaching; parental financial capacity to afford proper gear; the use of a grass wicket or a safe outfield; the opportunity to take part in a first-class match or to play against opponents experienced at such a level?”
A journalist called John Kay eased his path in chilly Lancashire, where he and wife Naomi later to remark on his surprise at seeing white people doing menial work and working as waiters in restaurants. Middleton only signed "Bas" when their scheduled professional failed to turn up... and the money wasn't good. Back in Cape Town, charity matches were held to fund his new life in England. Unfazed by his social elevation (from second class citizen in the land of his birth to ordinary bloke in a foreign land), Dolly was soon spotted by Worcestershire after topping the league batting averages ahead of a West Indian bloke by the name of Garfield Sobers.
He scored a century on his county debut, and another in his second appearance. Naturalisation as an true British citizen followed and after two prolific seasons at New Road, England came calling after he was named one of Wisden's Cricketers of the Year in 1967.
Despite whispers about his nationality from the conservatives at Lord's, "Bas" made his England debut against the West Indies at the age of 35. Who knows what would have happend had he stepped on the world stage in his twenties? He got 27 and a wicket at Lord's in that first Test, three successive 50s followed.

Then came the touring Australians in the first Ashes Test at Old Trafford. He sat out the second, third and fourth Ashes clashes but was back for the fifth at The Oval.
And now we remember the mythical 158, scored at just the right time to earn selection for the 1968-69 tour to South Africa. Somehow, the selectors contrived to leave him out. Rumours raged... until a chap called Tom Cartwright pulled out injured... and Dolly had his rightful place on the boat to Cape Town, his home town.
Then Balthazar Johannes Vorster, the South African president, made the worst call of his generally undistinguished political career. He was in Bloemfontein when he heard the news that D'Oliveira had been picked for England. Having been assured at the highest levels that the "coloured South African" would not be selected, BJ growled: "The team as constituted now is not the team of the MCC it is the team of the anti-Apartheid movement."
The world had heard enough. England promptly called off the tour, and the Peter Haine-led sporting boycott of South Africa, which hurt sports-mad South Africans so badly for 25 years, began. It would not end until the release of Nelson Mandela in 1990 and the rush to democracy in 1994.
Dolly went on to play 44 Tests for England, the highlight being the Ashes tour to Australia in 1970, when he famously wandered up to every Aussie available to push a finger in their chest and tell them: "We stuffed you!" after a 2-0 series win.

He declared his international career over a year later, ending with five Test centuries and an average of 44. But he went on to play for Worcestershire on a regular basis until 1977 when, at the age of 45, he topped the county averages. He kept playing the occasional championship game until he was nearly 50. registering 45 first class tons. Then he turned to coaching as the unfashionable midlands county won two titles in the 1990s and "Bas" had significant impact on the career of young Zimbabwean Graeme Hick, another who changed passports to play for England.

Dolly returned to South Africa after democracy, coaching the local clubs in Cape Town and generally doing good.
Years later, just after our meeting in Cape Town, Dolly was named one of the 10 South African cricketers of the century - despite being denied the chance to represent his country.
Even now, the Test series between England and South Africa are known as the battle for the "Basil D'Oliveira Trophy."
In 2005 he became a Commander of the British Empire in the Queen's Birthday Honours List. And the same year, they named the stand after him at Worcester's New Road ground.

Worthy tributes to a real character. Great knock, Dolly. There'll never be another quite like you.