Western Province Rugby’s efforts to sell Newlands Stadium were delayed by former Springbok Wynand Claassen wanting to “save the soul of apartheid South African rugby”, according to MARK KEOHANE.
WP Rugby’s pathway to the sale of Newlands is set to be cleared after a Western Cape Heritage committee decided not to declare the grounds a heritage site.
The decision still reportedly needs to be ratified by the committee’s board, but the Inventory, Grading and Interpretation Committee decided after a meeting on Friday that the Cape ground does not meet the criteria to be declared a provincial heritage site.
During Friday’s meeting, submissions were made by Claassen, who submitted the original application to declare Newlands a heritage site, as well as the Western Province Rugby Union (WPRU).
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In his TimesLIVE column, Keohane argued that the financial implications of not selling the stadium would ruin WP Rugby, and possibly all to entertain Claassen’s privileged nostalgia.
“Claassen, an apartheid-era white Bok captain, who played one Test at Newlands and played his provincial rugby elsewhere, romanced the notion of Newlands being the home of South African rugby for the past 130 years, when he should have being saying that up until unification in 1992, it was the home to white South African rugby,” he writes.
“Claassen was arguing heritage on the basis of nostalgia, but it was nostalgia for only a minority who were privileged to call Newlands their home for 100 years based on their white skin colour.
“There is no doubt those who had the privilege of sitting wherever they wanted to and who were allowed entry at every point, and for those who played there, the stadium has memories.
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“But Newlands excluded the majority of rugby people in the Western Cape for 100 years. The crowd images, pre 1992, show the segregation in who sat where and who stood where.
“There is so much pain for so many who were denied the opportunity to play at the stadium or watch from the comfort of the best seats in the house.
“DHL Stormers coach John Dobson, who played at Newlands and who grew up going to Newlands, was insistent before Friday’s decision that the Newlands did not represent a heritage to the squad of 2023 and that the new home of rugby in the Western Cape was the Cape Town Stadium in Greenpoint.
“WP Rugby, to survive, needs money and not the nostalgic memories of an elite and privileged minority. It also does not need a museum to remind the masses of what they were excluded from.”
Photo: Wessel Oosthuizen/Gallo Images