At 2:39 am on Friday, Sunshine Tour commissioner Thomas Abt’s phone buzzed him awake with the first message. It was from London. Once again, the world had changed. South Africa had been placed on a red travel list by the United Kingdom.
By 4 am, Abt was on the phone with Wimpie du Plessis, the Sunshine Tour’s COVID-19 chief compliance officer and a woman of immense pharmaceutical experience who has worked closely with the South African government since the start of the pandemic to engineer the safe resumption of golf. She was not amused. Du Plessis, a golfer herself, has a high tolerance for facts backed by science, and a very low tolerance for emotional decisions backed by other motives.
In her mind, a COVID-19 variant that first appeared outside the borders of South Africa and which was not “a South African variant” ticked her extremely low tolerance box. Even more so in light of a positivity rate that at this stage in the country stands at around 10 percent and less than 3,000 cases a day – far, far fewer than most European countries. Throw in certain evidence of this variant (now classified as “Omicron” by the World Health Organisation) not being that new at all and having existed for quite some time, and you can understand why du Plessis had plenty to discuss with Abt at 4 am.
By 6:40 am, the first professional golfer competing in the Joburg Open had messaged Abt. The next few hours were a flurry of meetings with the DP World Tour, sponsors, players and experts. But this train was already unstoppable.
Then came 23 withdrawals, a tournament reduced to 54 holes to allow a charter flight to fly European golfers home, and du Plessis arranging a complete on-site PCR testing solution within a few hours.
What was meant to be a full South African swing of international tournaments to mark a historic new era on the newly named DP World Tour had been cut off at the knees by a government decision, of which many are struggling to understand its scientific basis.
The result was a South African Open – the second oldest national Open in golf – reduced to a purely Sunshine Tour event with prize money dropping from $1.5 million to $500,000. And the Alfred Dunhill Championship, a flagship tournament that was to be played at one of the most iconic venues in world golf at Leopard Creek on the border of the Kruger National Park, cancelled altogether.
Literally overnight.
The loss of the Dunhill Championship in particular had one Sunshine Tour official burst into tears as she tried to comprehend the cancellation of a tournament that is very close to Sunshine Tour hearts.
In a time when we’re all being called upon to listen to the science, this decision doesn’t seem to have been a very scientific one. The words “overreaction” and “knee-jerk” have been used – and not lightly – in this context.
Maria Van Kerkhove, an infectious disease epidemiologist and the COVID-19 technical lead for the WHO, declared, “Do not discriminate against countries that share their findings openly.”
South Africa has managed the pandemic better than most European countries. It has done so while battling significant other challenges in ways that far exceed than most European countries. Unemployment and poverty rates surge, which in turn feed crime. Yet the nation has virus positivity rates far lower than many European countries.
When it comes to golf in particular, the Sunshine Tour has shown itself a leader in hosting international tournaments safely. Even at the height of the third wave in South Africa at the end of 2020, when the positivity rate was at close to 30 percent and there were almost 30,000 cases a day (not unlike the rest of the world), the Sunshine Tour and European Tour combined to host the Joburg Open, South African Open and Alfred Dunhill Championship in a strict bubble format without incident.
And yet, at 2:39 am on Friday 26 November, Abt’s phone buzzed with a message that was as dark as the storm clouds raging over Randpark Golf Club and which had caused several weather delays in the Joburg Open.
Ingrid Katz, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, declared, “We know what we know because South Africa has invested in advanced genomic sequencing. We owe them a debt of gratitude – not punishment.”
The WHO declared, “At this point, implementing travel measures is being cautioned against. The WHO recommends that countries continue to apply a risk-based and scientific approach when implementing travel measures.”
Angelique Coetzee, the chair of the South African Medical Association, was quoted as saying, “It’s all speculation at this stage … so are we seriously worried? No. We are concerned and we watch what’s happening. But for now we’re saying, ‘OK: There’s a whole hype out there. We’re not sure why.’ ”
In the 16th century, Roman author Pliny the Elder declared, “Semper aliquid novi Africam adferre” (Africa always brings us something new).
It’s a pity some still want to see only the same old story.
Top: The international arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport
E-Mail Michael