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Andy Flower, the former Zimbabwe captain and current England team
director, has spoken openly about his black armband protest at the 2003
World Cup to mark 10 years since he and Henry Olonga stood against "the
death of democracy" in Zimbabwe.
Flower reflected on the events of February 10, 2003, in Harare, when Zimbabwe played Namibia, in a BBC Radio 5 Live
programme and spoke in detail for the first time about what prompted
him to don the armband. He said that "given the same circumstances," he
would "without a doubt," do it again.
During one of Zimbabwe's worst periods of oppression in the early 2000s,
a friend of Flower's, Nigel Huff, took him to see the devastation on
his farm caused by land reform. He also told Flower the national cricket
team had a "moral obligation not to go about business as usual during
the World Cup but to tell the world what was going on in Zimbabwe."
Flower approached Olonga for two reasons. He thought Olonga would have
"the courage of his convictions to take a stand," and wanted to have two
people of different races making the same protest. "I also thought the
fact that it would be one white Zimbabwean and one black one operating
together gave the message the most eloquent balance," Flower said.
Together with David Coltart, then a human rights lawyer and now the
country's minister of sports, education, arts and culture, the idea of
armbands was conceived. Nobody in the team or elsewhere knew what Flower
and Olonga were going to do until the morning of their opening match
against Namibia.
Before play, a statement
was handed to the media containing details of the symbolism in their
gesture. It contained an explanation: "Although we are just professional
cricketers, we do have a conscience and feelings. We believe that if we
remain silent that will be taken as a sign that either we do not care
or we condone what is happening in Zimbabwe. We believe that it is
important to stand up for what is right.
"In doing so we are making a silent plea to those responsible to stop the abuse of human rights in Zimbabwe."
A copy of the statement is framed and hangs in Flower's study where he
occasionally re-reads it. "I love the way it was written - the meaning
in some of those sentences is very sad because it is a reminder of what
was happening in that country at that time and some of the people who
went through agony and lost their lives," he said.
During his interview with Alison Mitchell, she asked him to read it
aloud and he did. She recalled that he "struggled to keep his voice from
cracking," and "the emotion was evident in his eyes."
Although Flower said he knew his international career would end and he
would have to leave Zimbabwe, Olonga thought his life would go on in his
homeland. "I had in my own naivety thought I could carry on in Zimbabwe
- maybe my career would come to an end but I could still live there.
But that all changed when I got death threats two or three weeks after
the World Cup. I realised the game was up," Olonga said.
Olonga now lives in England where he works as a singer and public
speaker. He would like to return to Zimbabwe with his wife and two
daughters but would "need some guarantees that people who wanted to harm
me a few years ago do not still want to harm me," he said.
Flower would also like to return and hopes to go back to a better place.
"We can't all change the world, but if we all do little things along
the way and make the most powerful decisions we can then I think we can
bring about change," he said.
Andy's brother, Grant, is the current Zimbabwe's batting coach so the
family connection with the national team remains. However, Grant he will
not travel to West Indies on the forthcoming tour because of what ZC
termed a "technical change" to their structure.
Firdose Moonda is ESPNcricinfo's South Africa correspondent
Feeds: Firdose Moonda
© ESPN EMEA Ltd.
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