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Rooting out racism

DETERMINED: Tokyo Sexwale PHOTO: Bafana Mahlangu
DETERMINED: Tokyo Sexwale PHOTO: Bafana Mahlangu

UNSAVOURY incidents of racism and discrimination in sport could be a thing of the past, thanks to a concerted effort by Global Watch to fight the scourge.

"We are not going to fold our arms and do nothing when racism and discrimination take centre stage in sport. We will fight this to the end," said Global Watch founder and co-chairman Tokyo Sexwale yesterday.

Global Watch is an initiative that was launched last year to root out racism in world sport.

Qatari Sheikh Faisal bin Mubarak Al Thani is another chairman of the organisation that is driven by a partnership between the Sexwale Foundation, Nelson Mandela Foundation and Doha Goals Forum Foundation.

The organisation wants to send a message of intent to the cause by tackling the alleged racial incident that took centre stage during an Under-21 match between Manchester City and Croatian side HNK Rijeka on Tuesday.

It is alleged that one of Rijeka's players racially abused 19-year-old City French midfielder Seko Fofana, causing an abandonment of the friendly in Novigrad, west Croatia.

Sexwale said they will ensure that whoever was responsible would be brought to book.

"We are very much disturbed by this incident, especially that it happened in a friendly match," a clearly exasperated politician told Sowetan at the Sexwale Foundation House in Johannesburg yesterday.

"We applaud City officials and coach [Patrick Vieira] for taking the players off the pitch in protest at what happened to that boy [Fofana]. There was no other way to express their dismay than to leave the pitch. We are really encouraged by the stance taken by those young players."

Asked if they had the powers to punish perpetrators of racism in sport, Sexwale said: "We don't have the powers but we can put pressure on relevant authorities to deal with the culprits.

"We will engage Fifa, Uefa, football federation in that country [Croatia] and the club itself, to see how they can deal with this matter. We are ready to fight any form of racism in sport."

Reuters reported yesterday that the Croatian FA will examine claims of racism regarding the alleged incident. Rijeka strongly denied the claims.

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