D'Oliveira affair

A Cape Coloured of Indian and Portuguese ancestry, D'Oliveira left South Africa primarily because the era's apartheid legislation seriously restricted his career prospects on racial grounds and barred him from the all-white Test team.

South Africa's Prime Minister John Vorster sought to appease international opinion by publicly indicating that D'Oliveira's inclusion would be acceptable, but secretly did all he could to prevent it.

Days later, the MCC selectors omitted D'Oliveira from the team to tour South Africa; they insisted that this was based entirely on cricketing merit, but many in Britain voiced apprehension and there was a public outcry.

After Tom Cartwright's withdrawal because of injury on 16 September, the MCC chose D'Oliveira as a replacement, prompting accusations from Vorster and other South African politicians that the selection was politically motivated.

[note 2][7][8] Under apartheid, this became official policy under the government reasoning that black, coloured (mixed race) and Indian players were inherently inferior and not worthy of selection.

"[4] During the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) tour of South Africa during 1948–49,[note 1] the first under apartheid, the BBC commentator John Arlott was horrified when he saw a black man assaulted for no reason.

[29] He was left distraught by the cancellation in 1959, at the behest of South African anti-apartheid campaigners, of a proposed visit by a West Indies team which was to compete against non-white sides.

[40] In January 1968, Griffith wrote on behalf of the MCC to the South African Cricket Association (SACA) with the implication that the tour would be cancelled if a free selection was not guaranteed.

"[42] According to Oborne, Vorster never intended to allow D'Oliveira to play with the MCC team; his supporters would not have accepted a non-white South African benefiting from this change of policy and demonstrating his ability at a high level.

Douglas-Home, a former British Prime Minister and then the Opposition spokesman for foreign affairs, had just finished his term as MCC president and was visiting Rhodesia and South Africa; he agreed to raise the question of D'Oliveira during a meeting with Vorster that was part of his itinerary.

[50] Conscious of D'Oliveira's poor form in the West Indies and continued lack of success during early 1968, the MCC committee kept in mind that it was far from certain that he would even make the team to tour South Africa.

D'Oliveira's lack of success prompted press speculation that he might lose his England place for entirely non-political reasons, but Vorster was convinced that the MCC were committed to selecting him under any circumstances.

He and the SACA would attempt to bribe D'Oliveira to make himself unavailable, while simultaneously persuading the English selectors—or more specifically the MCC, who Vorster believed would determine selection policy—not to choose him.

[46] Allen later defended these actions, setting out his reasoning in his biography, which was written by his close friend Swanton[58]—Allen argued that the advice given by Douglas-Home, an international diplomat, took precedence over Cobham's information and had already been accepted by the MCC.

[59] Oborne dismisses Allen's reasoning as "disastrously muddled",[58] pointing out that Cobham's advice was far more up-to-date than Douglas-Home's, and that there would have been no burden of conscience for the team selectors as the new information would have caused the tour to be cancelled.

[64] This plan probably originated from one of the several South Africans present at Lord's with an interest in the D'Oliveira question, including Coy and the private cricket tour organiser Wilfred Isaacs; according to Fraser-Sampson, there is evidence to suggest that it first came from the SACA.

[68] While the game was taking place, Doug Insole, the chairman of the England selectors, introduced D'Oliveira to Isaacs, who offered him warm hospitality if he toured South Africa during the English winter.

He offered D'Oliveira work as a coach for the SASF on an annual salary of £4,000—a vast sum for a professional cricketer at the time—on the condition that he took up this role immediately at the end of the 1968 season, and thereby made himself unavailable for the MCC tour before selection took place.

[75] Oborne surmises that the position and salary offered to D'Oliveira did not come from the SASF, but were actually part of a scheme involving Vorster and Rupert to remove the controversial player from the tour.

D'Oliveira took a crucial wicket with his 12th ball to break a long partnership and open the way for Derek Underwood to bowl England to victory in the game and a share in the series.

[95] Williams, while acknowledging that there were several worthy batsmen as candidates for places in the team, asserts that even if those at the meeting had only discussed the players' respective cricketing abilities, "every selector must have known that by not selecting D'Oliveira they would improve the prospects of the tour going ahead.

[100] D'Oliveira, who learned of his omission over the radio in the Worcestershire dressing room having just scored 128 runs against Sussex, was deeply upset and faced intense press attention.

[100] Oborne writes that Insole considered the events surrounding the selection meeting as among the worst of his life, but that "he and the other selectors were victims of the decision, reached on the advice of Alec Douglas-Home early in 1968, not to press for an answer to the MCC demand there should be 'no preconditions' for the tour.

[note 7][105] Others, prominently the former England captain Ted Dexter, the former Test player Trevor Bailey and E. W. Swanton, all of whom generally sided with the cricket establishment, contended that D'Oliveira deserved to be in the team on merit.

[107] Other commentators, such as the Worcestershire club secretary and the former West Indies Test player Learie Constantine, openly stated that D'Oliveira was omitted either because of his race or because the MCC supported apartheid.

According to Cowdrey, Cartwright played without discomfort on 14 September, passed a fitness test the following day, and suddenly withdrew after an overnight reaction to his exertions, prompting the selectors to take only ten minutes to choose D'Oliveira as a replacement.

[121] In South Africa, Vorster heard that D'Oliveira had been added to the team shortly before addressing the Orange Free State National Party congress at Bloemfontein on 17 September.

[131] Coming just after New Zealand abandoned their 1967 rugby tour over South Africa's refusal to accommodate a mixed team, the cancellation of the 1968–69 MCC series over D'Oliveira marked the second such incident in two years.

In 1969, the South African Cricket Board of Control (SACBOC) announced that future teams would be racially integrated and selected purely on merit; efforts duly began to allow all races to compete against each other and share facilities.

The Australian Rugby Union severed ties with South Africa after the turbulent 1971 series, but its counterparts in New Zealand, France and the Home Nations retained links into the 1980s.