The Portfolio Committee on Sport and Recreation has expressed support of the South African Rugby Union’s (SARU’s) strategy on transformation.
However, a number of concerns were raised regarding the transformation within provincial unions, SARU’s executive council and the board. SARU was briefing the Committee on progress made in transformation including women’s rugby, participation by persons with disabilities, provincial demarcations, future transformation objectives and transformation operational plan.
The Committee welcomes the commitment to increase black participation in all SARU’s national teams, management and board to 50% by 2019. The Committee will be monitoring this transformation closely as it is important for SARU’s demographic dimension to be reflective of the country. The Committee has also noted the lack of gender representation on SARU’s executive council and management and hopes that transformation will also factor in this area.
The Committee is aware that it is difficult for black rugby players to break into the provincial and national teams and it is also difficult for black players who make it into the national team to keep their places in the team. This is because of the historical socio-economic conditions from which black players are drawn. There is also a need for the provincial academies to be established, administered by SARU, in areas where there is a need for development of rugby to assist with access and transformation of this sporting code in the future.
There are currently four academies and two of them are in the Western Cape and the Committee believes that there should be development of academies in all provinces so that rugby is not only developed in areas that are well resourced at the expense of rural under-resourced areas. The Committee is also concerned with the current state of school sport that shows that only elite private schools will always have an advantage over public schools due to the fact that they have incentives to entice talented players.
The Committee is also pleased with the intervention by the Minister of Sport and Recreation, Mr Fikile Mbalula, in identifying schools that can assist learners from disadvantaged areas to get opportunities to participate in schools where there are state of the art facilities. Initiatives like these are necessary in addressing transformation in rugby.
For media enquiries or interviews with the Chairperson, please contact:
Faith Kwaza
Tel: 021 403 8062
Cell: 081 377 0686
E-mail: fkwaza@parliament.gov.za
