Letter: Cricket SA buckled in David Teeger furore - Business Day

According to Cricket SA (CSA), David Teeger had to be removed as captain of the national U19 team because he was likely to be the focus of demonstrations that “could result in conflict or even violence, including between rival groups of protesters”.

Taking CSA at its word — media reports have questioned the veracity of its account — the body has chosen to join an extensive community of SA institutions that have legitimated pathologies in our public life.

Bombast about the sanctity of public order and the security of SA’s people is not only laughable in view of the realities of life in the country, but in view of the endless tolerance and bargaining with those who undermine it as a deliberate strategy.

At different times, this has been the preferred tactic of the taxi industry, student activists, workers’ unions, the EFF, and recently (and damagingly) the so-called construction mafia. That consequences have all too often been light, ineffective or absent has only emphasised that in SA violence is an effective tool.

That CSA buckled pre-emptively, surrendering Teeger’s position based on the ostensible threat that such conduct might occur — again, by its own account — was a particularly dishonourable course of action.

It has signalled that violence gets results and that threatening it is a rational tactic for activism. It incentivises such behaviour in future. The CSA might get trouble-free matches, but SA as a whole will pay for this far beyond the cost of any ticket.

Terence Corrigan
Institute of Race Relations

https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/opinion/letters/2024-01-28-letter-cricket-sa-buckled-in-david-teeger-furore/