Bavuma's XI & sports as the great unifier

In the years immediately after apartheid, the new President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela, found in sports a medium to impart his vision of reconciliation to a nation at odds with its racial diversity.

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When South Africa hosted the Rugby World Cup in 1995, Mandela offered the slogan, "One team, One country," to bring together a deeply divided nation. Rugby was the preferred sport of White South Africans, and Mandela's endorsement of the Springboks, exemplified by his appearance in a team jersey at the finals in Johannesburg, was a significant moment in that country's political and sporting history. South Africa won that final, an event on which Clint Eastwood made the 2009 movie, Invictus.