​In celebration of Women's Month, Dr Nana Adom-Aboagye from the Centre for Sport Leadership at Maties Sport writes in an opinion piece for News24 (21 August 2023) that more must be done to provide fair and just support, opportunities, access, resources, and incentives to women and girls in sport.

• ​Read the original article below or click here for the piece as published.

Nana Adom-Aboagye*

As we celebrate another Women's Month, it pains me to say that nearly 30 years since our first democratic elections and over three years since I completed my doctoral study on gender equity in sport-related policies, not much has changed for women in South African sport.

I may come across as somewhat jaded, but the adage by the French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr: “the more things change, the more they stay the same…" comes to mind. I say this because, in 2023 alone, events in the South African sporting landscape have touched on society's continued grappling (good and bad) with gendered mindsets, ideology and cultural viewpoints, which have often superseded formal 'policy' when it involves women in sport.

SuperSport declared 2023 as the year of women in sport with #HereForHer. This campaign started off with much fanfare and promise. Galvanising the country to sit up, take notice and support three of our top four national sports [by numbers] – cricket, netball and football – as our women prepared to compete at their respective world cups.

Our Protea women's cricket team made the T20 World Cup final that we hosted – a feat that even the men's team have yet to achieve. The tournament also broke global viewership records. This growth and improvement can be attributed to the intentional decision-making by Cricket South Africa in 2013, to initially offer six national team players contracts. This has now been expanded to offer various semi-professional, national and high-performance contracts to some of the women in provincial teams.

About a year before the hosting of the recently-concluded Netball World Cup (a first on African soil), Netball South Africa announced the contracting of players. Before this announcement, netball in the country swayed between amateur and semi-professional levels. Then there were the off-the-court challenges that received much coverage in the media, and the pulling out of the tournament's headline sponsor. This all culminated in the SPAR Proteas finishing the tournament in sixth position, whereas at the previous edition (sans contracts) in Liverpool they had finished in fourth place. 

Banyana Banyana's final preparation game at home before the 2023 FIFA World Cup in Australia/New Zealand should have been a celebratory sendoff. However, it dissipated into chaos, and off the field, challenges continued to mar the 'fairytale' performance of the team at the tournament where they made history by reaching the second round – an achievement not even attained by Bafana Bafana.

The commonality in the above performances can be attributed to gender-mindedness – its intentionality, and lack thereof in some instances. Gender mindedness  ̶  as raised in discussions at the Netball World Cup by my mentor and former PhD supervisor Prof Cora Burnett – is the ability to perceive fairness and justice correctly and openly in situations involving women in different spheres in society, including sport.

Although some national and provincial structures can be lauded for providing women with 'professional' contracts, sport for women in the country is far from being professional. I say this because there are no domestic professional leagues for sportswomen in the country. To be professional, sportswomen should be able to earn a living in sport and save from the income they receive from their contracts – such as is the case with their male counterparts.

For this to become a reality, the prevailing narratives around women and sport in the country need to change. A change in narratives requires a change in mindset from both men and women. A mindset change would require a nego-feminist approach, that is, an approach that calls for negotiation and compromise from men and women across the board to work together in providing fair and just support, opportunities, access, resources, and incentives to women and girls in sport.

I believe this is the hope of the gazetted draft National Women and Sport Policy which was released for public comment and input between March and June 2023. Many stakeholders and decision-makers in sport were not aware of its release and very minimal input was received from around the country. However, there will be provincial consultations towards the end of the year to gather further input and provide a greater understanding of the intent, monitoring and evaluation, and learnings of the policy once it is finalised.

The key then to change the prevailing narrative across the country for women and girls in sport, is to ensure that the policy is implemented. South Africa has many good policies, yet we falter at implementation. Implementation requires intent and commitment, which has been sporadic at best over the years.

I, for one, am looking forward to this as I continue to play my part. I also hope that this time next year, I will be writing a wholly different piece and that I will (in the future) be able to truly celebrate Women's Month without apprehension.

•  Photo by Alexander Fox | PlaNet Fox from Pixabay

*Dr Nana Adom-Aboagye is the Head of the Centre for Sport Leadership at Maties Sport at Stellenbosch University.