More Than Just a Game: Football v Apartheid

After three years he moved to Holland to play for the premier-league Dutch side Heracles and, as their star striker, raised the club’s game, leading them to finish near the top of the Dutch Eredivisie (premier division) for two high-scoring, breathtaking seasons. He was so loved by the Dutch fans that a street in Amsterdam was named after him.

In 1961 Mokone made his most important move – to Torino, in Italy, where he became the first black footballer in the world to earn the then phenomenal salary of £10,000 a year. In his first game for the Turin club, Mokone immediately proved his value by scoring all five goals in his team’s 5-2 victory over Verona. Before long, the Italian sporting press had dubbed him ‘the Maserati of soccer players’.

Back home, black South Africans kept a close eye on his international success, and in their own amateur football league were themselves enjoying something of a golden age. In the early Fifties, matches in Durban, Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Pretoria were attracting crowds of ten thousand; by the end of the decade, top black teams like Bush Bucks, the Wanderers, Zulu Royals, and City Blacks were regularly drawing attendances double that.

In 1956 the coloured Western Province team played a rare one-off friendly against the white Western Province side. The all-white team was the best in its league, having just won South Africa’s Currie Cup – a competition black and coloured teams were banned from entering. Captained by future cricket international Basil d’Oliveira, the coloured team trounced its white rivals 5-1. After eight years of apartheid, this win represented more than just victory on the field, and the rejoicing was epic.

Throughout the decade to follow, top English sides such as Manchester United, Wolverhampton Wanderers, and Tottenham Hotspur toured the country regularly. Their players might have been white, but at least they weren’t white South African, and the non-white sections of the South African stands echoed with roars of encouragement urging the English teams to put one over on apartheid’s players – and the black and coloured spectators weren’t disappointed. Occasionally, however, they had to pay the price of their support: it wasn’t unheard of for a non-white head in the crowd to be batoned and beaten by the security forces who policed the matches.

As it is throughout the world, football was central to the lives of many young South African men. Wherever there was an open space, inevitably, before long, there was a kickabout, so it wasn’t surprising that among the almost two thousand political prisoners who joined Tony, Marcus, Sedick, and Lizo on the island in the course of 1964 and 1965, there were many dozens of talented young players itching for a game.

Dimake Malepe was one of them. At just sixteen, he was one of the youngest prisoners on the island and also one of the best footballers. Before arriving at Robben Island, he played full-time in Cape Town and was soon nicknamed ‘Pro’ by his prison comrades. Others who were to make their mark early on were cousins and fellow trialists Mark Shinners and Dikgang Moseneke, who arrived on the island together, goalkeeper Sipho Tshabalala, and tough defender ‘Big Mo’ Masemola.

Indres Naidoo, too, although not himself a football player, would take on an important role in the prisoners’ crusade for the right to play. Imprisoned for sabotage, Indres had endured heavy torture while in detention but had never cracked. The authorities had a particular interest in him because most of the members of his family were active members of the ANC and well known to the security police.

The casual cell kickabouts that started in 1963 provided a vital diversion from the brutality of the prison and brought some much needed fun into the prisoners’ lives. The men may have been committed freedom fighters but they derived the same sense of achievement and release from football as any young man in any circumstances anywhere – and, again as with young men anywhere, the games became increasingly competitive. Tony Suze and Mark Shinners began to coach the other prisoners in ball skills but, despite this, there was a sense of frustration: in the end, they weren’t playing proper football. The more the men kicked their makeshift balls around the cells, the more they hungered for the real thing.

Of course, the men realized that this was against prison rules. Their desire to play real football on a proper outside pitch stood in stark contrast to the reality – the authorities’ almost total control over the prisoners’ lives. Initially, political prisoners on Robben Island weren’t allowed to talk to one another, let alone congregate in groups. Pencils were banned, and even board games such as chess, ludo, and draughts; team sports played outside were out of the question. If they were ever going to change things, to take football out of the cells and into the open air and play in proper teams, the men would, somehow, have to change the rules and gain official permission from the prison authorities.

When the cell-block players first talked openly about wanting to play organized football, some of their fellow prisoners laughed. They could not believe that the prison regime would ever even consider granting them permission. However, the footballers had been doing their homework and had formulated a way of using the prison system’s own rules to help them make their case.

According to these rules, prisoners confined in a cell for more than seventy-two hours had to be allowed out in the fresh air for exercise. Up until now, the prisoners’ exercise had taken the form of walking aimlessly round and round the compound – but why shouldn’t they be allowed to use this time to play football?

The first obstacle the prisoners had to overcome in this improbable protest campaign was to work out how to even ask this question. It wasn’t as if they could just pop along to the chief warder’s office, knock on the door, and waltz in with their demands. Again, prison regulations played into their hands. They would make their request during Saturday-morning klagtes and versoeke, a session which allowed the prisoners to raise any ‘complaints’ and ‘requests’ they might have.

These sessions were held in each of the cell blocks and gave the prisoners an audience with the chief warder, Captain Theron. The right to complain was enshrined within South Africa’s prison regulations and had to be seen to be enforced regularly at penitentiaries throughout the country. The apartheid regime prided itself on following rules and regulations to the letter, and was keen to give the impression internationally that it was fair and respected due legal process. However, there was no official obligation actually to act upon any of the prisoners’ complaints.

So, every Saturday morning, an empty charade was played out on Robben Island. The prisoners would file forward and register their objections – about the poor quality of the food, the clothing, and the working conditions. They would complain about the treatment meted out by the guards and the lack of any privileges. And each week, the chief warder would stare uninterestedly into the middle distance, shrug his shoulders, and dismiss the inmates and their complaints. Nothing changed, but the regulations had been observed.

Now, from late December 1964, inmates began to take it in turns to make the same request every week: ‘We would request to be allowed to play football.’ Early attempts were met with sneering derision by Captain Theron, who could hardly believe the audacity of the prisoners, and the prisoners’ campaign soon became the talk of the warders’ barracks. The staff were infuriated by the prisoners’ demand: in their eyes, it was totally unreasonable. These terrorists weren’t on the island to play sport and enjoy themselves, they were there to be punished, through hard labour and intimidation. Something would have to be done. There would have to be reprisals.

A few weeks into the campaign, Tony took his first turn at that Saturday’s complaints and requests session. He phrased the prisoners’ request in the same words – ‘We would request to be allowed to play football’ – and, without looking up, the chief warder demanded that a guard take Tony’s ‘ticket’, i.e., he was to be given no food during the following weekend. In the months to come, this was the form the authorities’ reprisals would take.

Despite the punishments meted out week on week, the prisoners continued to show resolve and unity. The men in each cell agreed among themselves who would make the request the coming Saturday, in the full knowledge that whoever it was would be put on a spare diet for two days. Perhaps not surprisingly, the keenest footballers on the island, such as Mark Shinners, Big Mo Masemola, and Pro Malepe, were among the first to step forward and sacrifice their food tickets. The prisoners tried to make sure that older men and those who were ill did not make complaints, but everyone was keen to participate. The men had used this selective approach successfully in the hunger strikes that had led to improvements in diet and clothing.

The prisoners’ persistence confused and baffled the prison regime’s hierarchy: why would men living an already harsh life wilfully set themselves up for further discomfort and punishment – and all over a stupid game?

The war of attrition dragged on through 1965, each side determined not to back down. It took a lot of strength for the prisoners to carry on but, as time went by, the campaign to secure the right to play football became a cause in itself, something for the men to rally around. It also brought additional, perhaps longer term and broader benefits: the will to play, and the mens’ efforts to win the right to do so, transcended political divides. Political divisions between parties permeated the men’s lives on the island, extending into all their activities but, now, supporters of PAC and the ANC began to mix to discuss their crusade, and men from both parties volunteered to step up at Saturday-morning complaints. And the longer they battled in common cause against their shared enemy, the intransigent prison authorities, the more the prisoners began to realize exactly how far-reaching the benefits of playing organized football might be.

Of course there was the sheer physical enjoyment of the sport, the thrill of pulling together as a team, the adrenalin of competition, and the motivation of pitting your own abilities against others’, but on Robben Island there was even more to be gained. The men’s fight to play league football was all about proving to themselves and to the prison regime that they were capable of organizing themselves, of acting with discipline, and of working in harmony together. It was about self-respect and developing a sense of community, despite everything.

There were also the psychological aspects to consider. Back on the mainland, Sedick Isaacs had read a number of books about the effects of long-term imprisonment, the mental vacuity and listlessness to which inmates could succumb. To survive and maintain some kind of emotional wellbeing, it was vital for the prisoners to keep physically and mentally active. They had to resist the efforts of the prison staff to grind them down. The introduction of studying had given many prisoners a purpose. Football would give them a passion.

Sedick could already see just how much of a boost the protest had given the men. The cell-block footballers held meeting after meeting to discuss how they would organize the matches, were permission granted. The meetings were always animated and often heated, and the prisoners became willing, and positively keen, to hold meetings to discuss other matters. If they won their campaign, football would also keep the men healthy and fit, in shape to resume their struggle against apartheid on their release, to effect the revolution Sedick firmly believed would eventually take place in South Africa.

The Saturday-morning requests and the officers’ reprisals continued into 1966. The chief warder remained as stubborn as the men were patient, the irresistible force against the immovable object. Things, though, were about to change.

The first clue came in the unlikely form of chunks of meat in the prisoners’ porridge and a delivery of clothing for a good number of the inmates. A few days later, a delegation from the International Red Cross (IRC) arrived on the island. The prisoners had found an important and unexpected ally.

The irony of the visit was not lost on some of the men. The official remit of the Red Cross is to visit sites of detention to monitor conditions for refugees and/or political prisoners and prisoners of war. It is not their task to do this for common-law prisoners. However, in the vocabulary of apartheid, there was no such thing as a ‘political prisoner’ in South Africa. The greater majority of the Category-D prisoners on Robben Island were officially termed ‘enemies of the state’ and regarded as nothing other than terrorists. With no inmates recognized as political prisoners and none granted the status of prisoners of war, why would the regime sanction a visit by the IRC?

As with its albeit shallow adherence to the complaints procedure, it was all to do with appearances, and with South Africa’s desire to be accepted as a fair player, and an ally, in a conglomerate of western democratic states.

International opinion of South Africa had become overwhelmingly negative, and the government was becoming increasingly concerned. In the wake of a number of sporting bans a couple of years previously that had drawn worldwide attention to the true excesses of apartheid, it was having to learn fast how to deal with outsiders intent on applying political pressure on the country.

In 1961 FIFA had imposed a ban on South Africa’s whites-only national team playing competitive or friendly games against other countries. However, its then president, the Englishman Sir Stanley Rous, a die-hard colonialist, had campaigned long and hard against what he described as political interference. He was content to ignore the fact that the South African government’s racial policies were a political decision that ensured that only whites could participate in international football at the highest level.

In 1963, the world ban was withdrawn based largely on Sir Stanley’s assessment that ‘South Africa’s coloured footballers are happy with the relations that have been established.’ He came to this conclusion after a short visit to South Africa in which he met men who were approved by the government and South African football officials. His opinion certainly would have come as a big surprise to the men on Robben Island.

White South Africa was playing international football again – but not for long. The following year, the annual FIFA conference was attended by a much larger contingent of delegates from Africa, Asia, and the Eastern Bloc than previously, most of whom roundly condemned any policy of segregation based on colour or race. The ban was put in place once more, in 1964. For the prisoners, this was morale-boosting news. South Africa would not be invited to rejoin the international football community for almost thirty years. In 1974, Sir Stanley lost his presidency to the Brazilian João Havelange, who used Rous’s actions concerning South Africa as a major focus in his campaign to unseat the long-serving Englishman.

New prisoners flooding on to the island brought more sports-related good news: the International Olympic Committee had followed FIFA’s example. It had demanded that South Africa formally and publicly renounce all racial discrimination in sport. The government refused to comply and was therefore not invited to participate in the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo. South Africa became the first country to be kicked out of the IOC, the first country to be banned from taking part in the Games. Also in 1964, it was learned that several tennis players at Wimbledon who had been drawn to play against white South African players had pulled out of the tournament.

On the mainland the security services had never been more completely in control of dissent and opposition, but the government was becoming more and more concerned at these sporting organizations’ attempts to isolate the nation. It had no intention of changing course over apartheid but was worried about the potential effects of international boycotts on its economic partners around the world – governments and large companies who wanted to invest in South Africa. Begrudgingly, the South African government began to see the sense in allowing the International Red Cross on to Robben Island.

During that first visit, the prison authorities did everything within their power to pull the wool over the delegation’s eyes. As well as making a show of the improved food and new clothing, warders were encouraged to be courteous to the prisoners. The prison was to appear to offer all inmates a range of activities and recreation opportunities. To this end, Nelson Mandela and the other senior political leaders in the isolation cells were supplied with sewing kits and material. Category-D prisoners in the communal section were let out of the cell blocks for an exercise session, and Red Cross officials were allowed to conduct a few short, unsupervised interviews with a number of inmates. Their complaints and accusations about life on the island seemed curiously at odds with the sanitized version presented to the delegation by the prison authorities.

Although this first visit from the Red Cross did lead directly to the provision of better clothing for the inmates, the delegation was generally conservative in its judgements and restrained in its criticism of the Robben Island regime. Over time, this would change, thanks in no small part to one fiercely independent critic of the effects of apartheid on South African life, Helen Suzman MP.

Helen Suzman MP was a white politician who fought tirelessly for liberty and equality for all South Africans. She was one of that rare breed in the Sixties, a female politician. She was isolated in other ways because of her party affiliation. In 1961, eight years after having entered Parliament, she was the only remaining member of parliament of the Progressive Party. She would continue to be a lone member until six colleagues joined her in 1974. She justifiably had no faith in the official opposition party, which had become virtually indistinguishable from the ruling National Party on important issues affecting the majority of South Africans. Suzman was not afraid to stand as a lone independent and shine a light on the darker recesses of the regime. Her status as an MP gave her the right to visit prisons and, much to the staff’s irritation, she arranged visits to Robben Island, starting in 1967, to see for herself the conditions and talk to the inmates.

When Suzman arrived on the island, she was the first woman many of the men had seen for well over three years. She spoke with Nelson Mandela in the isolation block and dozens of prisoners in the general section. One of the men told her that there was a guard with a swastika tattoo on his arm, and Suzman complained to South Africa’s Director of Prisons. He dismissed her concerns initially but soon took notice when she threatened to call a press conference, inviting representatives of the world’s newspapers. A few short weeks later, to the jubilation of the inmates, ‘Suitcase’ Van Rensburg was quietly transferred to a less high-profile prison on the mainland.

Suzman continued to make conditions on Robben Island known to the public, putting pressure on international agencies such as the Red Cross to do more than scratch below the surface and to investigate the prisoners’ complaints more fully.

Successive visits from the IRC became increasingly critical of the prisoners’ life on the island. The prison regime grew to dread the agency’s arrival and, in a game of cat and mouse that was to be ongoing, they did everything they could to hoodwink its representatives. Their efforts were not to meet with lasting success. The barren island off the tip of the Cape, South Africa’s most heavily guarded, most controlled patch of land, was to become the government’s most public Achilles’ heel.

Sensing their opportunity, the would-be soccer players regularly made the same appeal to members of the Red Cross as they did at Saturday-morning complaints. In turn, the Red Cross asked the chief warder why their request could not be granted.

Coming under increasing pressure to make concessions, the prison administrators presented a variety of excuses. Allowing the prisoners to play football would be a major security issue. The prison didn’t have the manpower to guard and supervise large numbers of men in the open (other, of course, than for their work in the quarry). Matches would have to be played at the weekends, when fewer staff were on duty. In any case, there was no pitch. The prisoners didn’t have kit, football boots – or even a ball. Furthermore, football would be bad for the prisoners’ health: they were too weak to take part in regular matches.

The men were heartened by the pressure being put on the authorities from outside but were also aware that the Red Cross came only on periodic visits. The prisoners’ most potent weapon remained their resolve and, in the end, their single-mindedness paid off.

In early December 1967, after three years of unremitting requests, the prisoners were informed that the chief warder had granted them permission to play football for thirty minutes every Saturday. They had won.

The chief warder told his officers that it was almost certain that the prisoners would tire of playing football, that they were too feeble to play a vigorous sport. It wouldn’t last two weeks. In his white supremacist eyes, not only were the prisoners too physically weak, they were also far too undisciplined to organize regular matches and teams. If they didn’t lose interest in the whole project, the regime could use the threat of withdrawing the privilege as yet one more means of controlling the prisoners. If football meant that much to them, being deprived of it would hit them hard. In addition, it was good propaganda. What better way to appease opinion in the West, and the Red Cross, than to make such a magnanimous gesture towards their prisoners? What better way to show how unafraid the regime was of its enemies than to let them play games? The regime was on a winning ticket.

In the cell blocks, the men were ecstatic, but intense debates immediately began to take place about whether or not the prisoners should actually take up the authorities’ offer. Marcus Solomon, for one, wanted to exploit the opportunity they had been given, to make political capital out of it, and use it to try and improve the prison diet. In order to play football, the men would need more calories and energy – but should they wait until they were granted better food before playing, or should they play and then launch their campaign for a better diet?

To the men, it was obvious that their campaign to win the right to play outside matches was about much more than just the game of football itself. Having joined together to pursue the campaign and won this concession from the prison regime, they had recaptured a sense of self-determination, and they now realized that they could capitalize further on the situation, exploit their new right as a bargaining chip. Food was the first issue, and their initial debate was decided: they would take up their privilege and play, and campaign for better food later.

On a windy Saturday morning in December 1967 warders strode into Cell Block Four and chose two teams of prisoners at random from those who had volunteered to play. One side chose the name Rangers, the other Bucks, and they ran proudly on to the playing area that had been cleared next to the cell blocks. It had less grass than the township pitches the men had played on as free men and was treacherously bumpy. The prisoners had no kit or football boots, so they played in their prison uniforms and most were barefoot. One thing, however, had been taken care of: there was a small crowd of spectators gathered around the makeshift pitch. The guards had allowed a handful of other inmates out to watch the match.

From the opening whistle, it was obvious that the poor physical condition of most of the men was affecting the quality of the football being played, as was the length of time they had been prevented from playing a proper game. Three or four years of not having played with a real ball, or on a pitch that was not made of cement and enclosed by the walls of a shared prison cell, had taken its toll. The game was riddled with poor passes and badly timed tackles, and the men’s lack of match fitness and stamina were obvious. None of this mattered to the players or the gaggle of fans. For them, it was the most exciting event that had ever taken place on Robben Island.

The final result of this thirty-minute match is not recorded, but everyone who took part walked off a winner. They were the pioneers, and they returned to their cell blocks with cheers and applause ringing in their ears. Football on the island had begun.

Matches took place every Saturday – of course, the men’s enthusiasm and dedication endured, confounding the chief warder’s confident prediction that it wouldn’t last two weeks. The standard of play continued to be poor, but no one was poking fun at the players’ lack of stamina or skill – it seemed nothing short of a miracle that they were out there kicking a football at all – and morale among the inmates couldn’t have been higher. Spectators waved homemade banners and sang football chants, demonstrating not only their allegiance to their team but their own growing sense of identity and comradeship.