I was disgusted to learn that Orlando Pirates is planning to play a friendly against a football club from Israel. Gasant Abarder writes in his latest #SliceofGasant that it will undo an 86-year legacy of a club that shone light in the darkest days of apartheid South Africa.
Abarder, who recently launched his book, Hack with a Grenade, is among the country’s most influential media voices. Catch his weekly column here.
Jeepers, Orlando Pirates, have you guys forgotten who you are? If you have, let me remind you. Since 1937, you have given hope to millions of black South Africans through football. For 90 minutes at a time, the Buccaneers brought a bit of light in the darkest of times in apartheid South Africa.
So, it was like a dagger to this fan’s heart when he learnt that you’re planning to play Maccabi Tel Aviv of Israel in a pre-season friendly in Spain later this week.
There is nothing friendly about apartheid Israel. There is nothing friendly about a murderous regime that has no regard for life – even whilst people are praying peacefully in a mosque. There is nothing friendly about invading people’s homes and stealing their land. There is nothing friendly about Israeli soldiers showing zero mercy against women and children.
As a fan, I am urging you not to play on the same field as this club from a terrorist state.
Sometimes, I think you’ve forgotten about your mighty legacy on the football field too. You haven’t won a league title in years. But that isn’t the reason I’ve supported you since I was 19 years old when I was living and working in Joburg as an intern. I, like many of your supporters, was drawn to your club because of what it represents.
I proudly wear the skull and crossbones merchandise because in a topsy-turvy country like ours, you – and clubs like Kaizer Chiefs – are constant reminders that we can overcome. Your supporters went through immense hardship in Soweto and now they are free to travel the lengths and breadths of this country supporting you.
No matter where you play, there is fanatical support. PSL games hardly fill a stand at the Cape Town Stadium, except when Pirates play there and your fans fill all the stands, along with the faithful of Chiefs and Sundowns.
Your history and your continuing story as a force in the fabric of South African life can never be underplayed.
Football is a funny old game. Just as it unites millions around the world and helps us overcome our differences it can and must have the opposite effect too. Football is geopolitics. As quickly as FIFA and UEFA rightly banned Russian football for its country’s invasion of Ukraine it still allows Israel to participate as a national team and its clubs in competition despite its illegal occupation of Palestine and breaking all and every international law with its aggression against Palestinians.
Elsewhere, the western media scribes express their consternation that Saudi Arabia is amassing the world’s football Galacticos and calling it sports washing. There is plenty, of course, to hold Saudi to account for – not least human rights atrocities. But that doesn’t stop Sky Sports from showing immense interest now that the best is being attracted to the Saudi league. Also, it’s not considered sports washing when millions of dollars are offered to players to play in the US Major League Soccer – which is essentially a farmers’ league.
There are plenty of fickle contradictions in the world of football. But we hold you to a higher standard, Orlando Pirates. As a club that played such a massive role in giving the oppressed black masses of South Africa hope when there was little to be hopeful about, surely you can understand the consequences of entertaining a club from Tel Aviv on the football field? I know for your fans it is about more than just football. We celebrate all you do – win or lose.
If the powers that be at Orlando Pirates are not to be swayed from pursuing this ill-conceived fixture, then surely the PSL, SAFA or the South African government needs to intervene.
If you go ahead with this friendly, I am done supporting Orlando Pirates. It will be a betrayal of all your club stands for and has the danger of wiping away an 86-year legacy of being on the right side of the fight and morality.
Orlando Pirates’ response:
Orlando Pirates’ core functioning is governed by rules. It is to the rules that Orlando Pirates went when confronted with calls to withdraw from playing Maccabi Tel Aviv. There is no cultural boycott or boycott of any form by either the South African government, FIFA or the host country that Orlando Pirates can base its refusal to play against Maccabi Tel Aviv on. Heeding a call from any other body would create a conflict within Orlando Pirates that would undermine the club’s values and history irreparably.
Read the full statement here.
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Picture: Gasant Abarder