AfriForum welcome decision

Johannesburg - AfriForum has welcomed the withdrawal of the proposed sport regulations, which would have empowered the Minister of Sport to such an extent that he would even have been able to interfere in team selections.

AfriForum described the canning of these regulations as a victory for all sport lovers who are opposed to political interference in sport. According to media reports, a source in the Department of Sport indicated that these controversial regulations will be retracted.

Kallie Kriel, CEO of AfriForum, stated that the Department of Sport had no other choice than to withdraw the regulations, as political interference in sport is expressly prohibited by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the soccer body FIFA, as well as all other major international sport federations.

"Especially with the 2010 Soccer World Cup Tournament just round the corner, the implementation of politically driven sport regulations would have cast an international shadow across South African sport," Kriel added. He emphasised that AfriForum has already started with a process to bring the political interference in South African sport under the attention of international sport federations.

Kriel however also expressed his dissatisfaction with the fact that the Department of Sport used the proposed regulations, which have now been withdrawn, to force local sport federations into certain decisions, without the regulations even being binding at all. An example in this regard, is that the South African Rugby Union (SARU) voted with the shadow of the proposed regulations being held over their heads, in favour of relocating the Springbok emblem from the left to the right side of rugby jerseys.