Africa's World Cup: Critical Reflections on Play, Patriotism, Spectatorship, and Space

Forum on the 2010 World Cup: Perspectives from South African Practitioners

219 Forum on the 2010 World Cup Perspectives from South African Practitioners CoNveNoR ANd modeRAToR: PeTeR AlegI WITh ThAbo dlAdlA, mohlomI kekeleTSo mAubANe, ANd RodNeY ReINeRS The 2010 World Cup in South Africa was widely celebrated as a huge success. What did the event mean to you? mohlomI kekeleTSo mAubANe: To better understand what the World Cup meant to me, I’d like to go back to 1990. I was staying in a rural township called Bapong, just outside Brits in what is now the North West Province. I was in Standard 4 (Grade 6), and my daily routine entailed going to school, coming back home to do my chores, like fetching water from the communal tap, and then going to “Ellis Park,” the neighborhood sandlot, to play soccer. I enjoyed imitating my favorite players: Doctor Khumalo, Mark Tovey, Marks “Go Man Go” Maponyane , Reggie Jantjies, Tebogo Moloi, and Innocent Mayoyo. When darkness fell, I would return home to do homework. At the time, only a few people in Bapong had electricity in their homes, and most families did not own TV sets. However,Thabo, one of the older boys at Ellis Park, had a small black-and-white TV powered by a car battery, and we would watch big matches at his place. I remember watching a final between Kaizer Chiefs and Moroka Swallows—I think it was the Castle Challenge Cup Final when Noel “Phinda Mzala” Cousins scored for the Dube Birds [Swallows] in the first minute. But typical of the Kaizer Chiefs teams of that era, Shane MacGregor equal- 220 • AFRICA’S WoRld CuP ized in the last minute, before Fani Madida scored the winning goal in extra time as Amakhosi clinched yet another trophy. In the final years of isolation from FIFA, football on South African television meant the National Soccer League (NSL). That was it! No World Cup, no African Nations Cup, no European Cup. Despite the lack of television coverage, I already knew about Pelé and Maradona. My father liked telling my brother and me football stories from back when he was still a young man growing up in Soweto. He told us about past South African greats like Chippa Moloi, Al Die Hoekies, Dharam Mohan, Alfred “From Russia with Love” Jacobs, Ratha Mokgoathleng, and many, many others. I suspect that it is from my father that I first heard about Maradona and Pelé. Since only a handful of households in Bapong had electricity and television sets, a culture developed of people visiting their “welloff ” neighbors to watch TV. This was done mostly on Tuesdays and Thursdays, when the local African-language drama or soap opera was screened. My folks, especially my mother, were not too keen on this, and so my grasping of the Lesilo Rula or Ululu Ubuyile story line was often courtesy of a narration from a classmate who, in the oral tradition of our ancestors, in turn might have been told the plot of the previous night’s episode by a friend who watched the drama at their neighbors’ place. Suddenly, one Saturday evening, our parents for the first time granted my three siblings and me permission to watch TV at a friend’s home. Not only was this the very first time we were allowed to venture out at night, the special occasion was the opening match of Italia 1990 between world champions Argentina and the Indomitable Lions of Cameroon. This was the very first time a World Cup match was broadcast live in South Africa. It was also the first time I saw Maradona with my own eyes. By the end of the match, Cameroon had won my heart. I only watched two other games during Italia ’90, the West Germany versus England semifinal and the final. By the end of the tournament, I had new heroes: Cameroonian Roger Milla, and AC Milan’s Dutch trio of Frank Rijkaard, Marco van Basten, and Ruud Gullit. I have been an AC Milan fan since then and have always had a soft spot for the Indomitable Lions. That Argentina versus Cameroon match signaled the beginning of my relationship with the World Cup. Forum on the 2010 World Cup • 221 By 1994, at home and in South Africa, things had improved. By then, we were staying in Lebanon Township in Mabopane. Our home was the quintessential four-roomed kasi (house) you find in black townships in South Africa, and...