Through My Eyes

Author: Kasia Yoko
Date: 2014-02-21

So while the Olympics games play out in Sochi and the weather plays havoc with the athletes one South Africa Sportsman is feeling miserable today.

The heart-breaking story of SA slalom skier Sive Speelman has not really made it into the mainstream media, but snuck into the lives of us ordinary folk. Sive is originally from the impoverished Eastern Cape and has been training for years with the dream of reaching the Olympics.

And so against all odds, and with a lot of hard work, he earned a spot at Sochi Ñ and would have been our country's first-ever black competitor in the Winter Games.

Sive who is eighteen was prevented from going to Sochi by his own countrymen thus for the first time since 1994, after post-apartheid South Africa was readmitted to the IOC, no athlete is representing our country at the Winter Games.

It is a sad day for South African sport when we cannot support a talent. If Sive was allowed to compete he would have been the first black African "that has come through Africa" to compete. Imagine what a role model he could have been to the kids in the remote village of Barkly East - home to SA's only ski resort.

From an early age Sive has been learning to ski in Tiffindell and he fell in love with the sport and with the help of his coach Alex Heath, the journey to the Olympics began. It was his dream since Sive was nine years old.

But instead of standing amongst his peers in Sochi's Fisht Olympic Stadium, at the opening of the Winter Games, where he would have been the lone South African, Sive was sitting back in his remote hometown, a broken young man.

Today Sive is a broken man and he can't understand what he's done wrong. He feels he's been "robbed." What could have been the proudest moment for us South Africans to watch one of us competing in the Olympics some idiot in The South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee decided that Sive was not worthy.

How is it possible that Zimbabwe sent a skier but South Africa held our only candidate back? In the entire history of the Winter Olympics, the continent of Africa has never won a single medal; Sive could have been the person who could have brought some country pride to our poor self-image.

South Africa has sent athletes to every Winter Games since Lillehammer in 1994, the first following the country's readmission to the IOC after apartheid. It has never won a Winter Games medal.

It was a long hard road to qualify, and Sive earned his place. What a tragedy. Dimitriy Kaverinesent Sive a message via facebook, "We in Russia miss SA team but do remember you and send our warmest greetings and support! - Please do help Sive come to our Games - even not as a competitor he is to have a real media wild card and the warmest welcome from everyone!.. c'mon Springbok!"

Its clear Sive is a likable guy. Did The South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee even meet him before they made the decision that will have a profound affect on his life?

Send Sive some encouraging comments on his facebook site, from what I have read his spirit is crushed, visit Sive Speelman's Olympic Dream, and give him some of the support he deserves and worked so hard for.

Springclean

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Nissan T5ekton

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