When I woke up this morning and swiped open my phone, the first message I saw was a video posted to WhatsApp by my aunt. The clip was a five-minute sizzle reel set to the soundtrack of Sister Bettina celebrating the might of the South African national rugby team and the fighting spirit of the grateful nation supporting them.
I watched the clip from start to finish and started crying during the first minute. I understood I was crying both because I love this country and because I was racked with anxiety about whether we would win this weekend’s World Cup final. The experience reminded me of the power of national narrative-building, and how it can build goodwill among even the most divided people.
Earlier this month, in the minutes after the Springboks’ victory against France in the quarterfinals, the young South African activist Sizwe Mpofu-Walsh tweeted a darkly humorous post-match analysis: “South Africa continuing the African trend of expelling France. #FRAvRSA”.
Mpofu-Walsh’s comment was a reference to France’s declining influence in francophone Africa. The region has experienced five military coups over the past three years. In each case, citizens cited the heavy-handed influence of French President Emmanuel Macron’s administration on their national affairs as a key driver of anti-French sentiment.
Mbuyiseni Ndlozi, the EFF MP and the party's former spokesperson, was quick to challenge Mpofu-Walsh’s comparison: “Kodwa Hlubi, you are pushing it,” he countered. “A [w]hite-dominated team expelling France in Africa — isn’t it just another Anglo-Boer War? Or are you mobilis[ing] us in that fake rainbowism of ‘stronger together’? And then umhlaba (the land)? #StrangerTogether.”
Ndlozi’s remarks were roundly rejected by observers of this exchange. Some of the more indignant replies included “Ndlozi had to spoil it; racism in everything …”, “Stick to math, iceboy”, and “Dr Ice. Taking L’s. We are stronger together. That's why the vast majority don't vote for you”.
This wasn’t Ndlozi’s first brush with the national narrative — a discourse usually premised on a series of myths and powered by a belief in the exceptionalism of one’s nation.
In November 2019, Ndlozi tweeted his congratulations to Springbok captain Siya Kolisi for the team’s World Cup victory over England, but said the rest of the team should “go get your congratulations from Prince Harry”. His remarks drew the ire of the late Kiernan “AKA” Forbes as well as various DA supporters.
Ndlozi was also accused of “politicising sport” — a wild accusation, since sport plays a pivotal role in the political work of national narrative-building. The task of building complex national mythologies which shape a “national character” is most often taken up political leaders, who need a narrative to build political campaigns or seek support for their plans.
Siya Kolisi and South Africa’s starting XV are complex individuals representing a complex nation
South Africa’s own foundational myth is that of the "Rainbow Nation", immortalised by Nelson Mandela in his 1994 presidential inaugural speech: “We enter into a covenant that we shall build a society in which all South Africans, both black and white, will be able to walk tall, without any fear in their hearts, assured of their inalienable right to human dignity — a rainbow nation at peace with itself and the world.”
Mandela did more to build a national narrative and collective identity in South Africa than any other political figure in the country’s democratic history. But, like most national narratives, it was more mythology than reality.
Thirty years of democracy have not adequately delivered on the promise of those heady early days. Younger generations of South Africans now reject “rainbowism”, which is seen as glossing over the injustices of daily life for the black majority.
This is what we must remember as we respond to the result of the World Cup final. We have a world-class rugby team that represents our nation’s sporting prowess. That team is led by a captain whose personal story is so uniquely South African that it seems to run parallel to our triumphant national story.
But Siya Kolisi and South Africa’s starting XV are also complex individuals representing a complex nation. Their winning cannot smooth away the hard injustices of daily life in our country. Nor should they be so burdened with our anxieties as to feel they are carrying an entire nation’s hopes on their shoulders.
