Invictus: the most important game ever played

When people think of great world changing events it is usually of grand battles; landscape changing elections; or the savagery of executions. New film Invictus, featuring Matt Damon and Morgan Freeman released this month, shows that a rugby game should also be added to that list: South Africa’s victory over New Zealand in the 1995 rugby world cup final.

Whilst to most international observers (including a deeply impressionable six year old me) it was a thrilling game of rugby, finally decided by Joel Stransky’s iconic drop goal deep into extra time. But to the people of South Africa it was a turning point in the healing of a nation. How one game had the power to kick-start the healing of the nation is due to both the importance of rugby in South Africa and the extraordinary reconciliation skills of President Mandela.

The timing of its UK release on the 4th of February, close to the 20th anniversary of Mandela’s release from prison of 11th February is unlikely to coincidence with the related upsurge in interest in all things Mandela. But why was this game of rugby, over five years after Mandela’s release, to prove so important? To answer that it is necessary to look further into South Africa’s apartheid past.

Whilst the Afrikaner Nationalist Party’s (ANP) policy of Grand Apartheid where white superiority was enshrined in law had officially only lasted from 1948-1990, there had White ascendancy almost since colonisation. In this openly racist system there was no more potent symbol of white dominance than the green and gold springbok jersey. The Bokke captain was always the toughest and the bravest, the modern Hoofdkommandant (commando leader), respected by all in the white community.

Rugby went beyond being a recreation to a sport played and supported with a religious-like fervour, backed up with the assurance that they were the very best in the world. No international condemnation or economic sanctions imposed by foreign governments hurt the white South African quite as hard as not being able to prove they were the best rugby players in the world. Official touring teams got banned by their home unions or governments and any South African side attempting to play abroad were meant with determined and disruptive protest. Hardware stores recorded a marked increase in the sale of nails the week a South African university team was touring, intended for scattering on the playing field by protestors.

It was not only abroad that South Africans were experiencing violence. Since announcing the end of apartheid the government had spend four years trying to keep the ANC out of office. The election of Mandela in 1994 had merely intensified the actions of both White extremists, such as the Neo-Nazi Weerstandsbeweging (AWB), and Zulu separatists like the Inkatha Freedom Party. Whilst the AWB held rallies that on the surface seemed little more than over-aged scout jamboree’s, amongst its ranks it could count numerous former soldiers and special forces and had easy access to strong arsenals of weaponry. Inkatha was almost its direct antithesis but potentially more dangerous, revelling in township violence with its favourite method of execution being the ‘necklace:’ lighting a petrol-drenched tire shoved over the victims head.

Both promised little short of civil war, making the country ungovernable. Yet, both were slightly balanced by Mandela’s efforts at the World cup. In the townships the goodwill factor generated by the victory and Mandela’s unitary efforts did not reduce crime overall, but did reduce political murders and intimidation. The AWB lost a good deal of ground support as South Africa’s whites witnessed that Mandela was not a threat to their cherished Bokkes. Extreme white action has not since threatened the government of South Africa.

That Afrikaner manhood was inexorably pinned to the fortunes of 15 men was well understood by Mandela, but it was a game and a symbol hated by black South Africa, 80% of his country’s population. Black South Africans would support any side playing against the Springboks, cheering for victory over their oppressors. The 15 white men on the pitch did not represent them, and although at the time of the world cup Chester Williams had earned a place in the side he was a solitary black figure.

The South African council for sport had wished to eradicate the springbok emblem. Strength of feeling is indicated by the fact there are political elements that still do, to be replaced by the Protea, a desert flower now used by the cricket team. As Invictus portrays it was Mandela’s involvement that saved the Bok, a vital step in his plan to win over white South Africans.

Rugby throughout the world is inherently linked with conservatism. George Orwell’s line that a bomb under Twickenham’s west car park would set the course of British Fascism back a Generation is typical. Mandela’s masterstroke was in embracing the sacred Bok and ‘winter colours’ by donning the shirt of captain Francois Pienaar. In one stroke he had removed its stigma for the black population, and shown the white population the importance he attached to the Bokkes.

By the final Mandela had succeeded in creating his ‘One team, one nation’ goal. PR stunts and above all Mandela’s personal involvement meant Pienaar could accurately state that, “43 million South Africans were supporting us.”

Sadly, the spirit of the rainbow nation may not be lasting. South African Mcndisa Shanga believes there are three important tests facing South Africa’s future: “The 2010 world cup, the possible re-election of President Jacob Zuma and the death of Madiba [Mandela].”

Can South Africa survive the scrutiny of the world during the world cup? Can it weather the curse of tribal politics Zuma seems intent on bringing? And can it not tear itself apart in its grief when Mandela finally passes?

I think the answer to all of these is yes, but only because in the country’s darkest hours it had a leader able to see the correct path. Whilst there is no such thing as a historical certainty, it is likely that if South Africa had not had Mandela it would be headed the way of modern Zimbabwe all too quickly. And the huge knock on effect this would have on the rest of the continent is almost unfathomable.

However, had it not been for the success of the rugby world cup, it is equally likely Mandela wouldn’t have achieved the level of success he did. I give the penultimate words to Mandela “Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire, it has the power to unite people, in a way that little else does.” Had Stransky missed his drop goal South Africa, and the world, would be a very different place indeed.

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