Give Liverpool the boot
In reality, all smoke and mirrors when one considers the increasingly intense racial machinations of our own Ethekwini Municipality.
EDITOR – There was a time when one would get all dewy-eyed at this talk of a rainbow nation, reconciliation, our world renowned constitution, and stuff like that. In reality, all smoke and mirrors when one considers the increasingly intense racial machinations of our own Ethekwini Municipality.
Mind you, this does help dispel illusions.
Take for example the matter of sports clubs in Durban. According to newspaper reports, English Premier League league football club, Liverpool, in a questionable partnership with the Ethekwini (Durban) Municipality and others, is establishing a football academy on municipal property in Durban, in the process evicting current tenant, Berea Rovers Sports Club.
Berea Rovers Sports Club has existed for many years and is about to be thrown off the property because, according to Thembinkosi Ngcobo, head of Durban’s Parks and Recreation department, Rovers membership “mostly still consists of people from the white community”. Many other local sports clubs, perceived to be too white, are also currently under threat of eviction. According to city council Speaker, Logie Naidoo “these clubs still have predominantly white membership”.
Liverpool Football Club is a well-informed, professional organisation and must surely be fully aware of the circumstances. It should also be aware that, in what has become part of our daily fare in South Africa, minority groups in general and whites in particular are frequently cast in the role of enemy by the governing party and its various functionaries. The fact that Messrs Ngcobo and Naidoo feel free to unabashedly utter such racist comment speaks volumes. And what does one make of the fact that they are destroying a South African sports club and replacing it with a foreign one?
As for Liverpool, they have taken a high-profile stand against racism in soccer and rightly so. In fact, their anti-racism slogan states: “Racism has no place at Liverpool Football Club”. However, Liverpool’s actions here in the city of Durban make nonsense of such claim. If it is indeed non-racist, why then is Liverpool FC knowningly participating in what is, in effect, ethnic cleansing?
Apart from moral and ethical considerations, it appears Liverpool Football Club is also in contravention of the English Football Association’s ‘rules of association’ as well as the statutes of UEFA and FIFA. These august entities should be asked to take action accordingly.
Self-respecting South Africans should give Liverpool the boot!
JEFF VAN BELKUM
