When I was a kid, I thought Basil D’Oliveira was the inventor of Dolly Mixtures. At the age of seven, I knew that he was a controversial figure, but wasn’t sure of the details. Maybe, he’d stolen the secret Dolly Mixture formula from another sweet manufacturer. Or maybe it was something more sinister; maybe he used his colourful sugary sweets to lure young children to his house for his own perverted purposes. But no, apparently Basil D’Oliveira wasn’t a kiddie fiddler or a fraudulent confectionery manufacturer, but a non-white South African, whose inclusion in the England cricket team in 1968 according to Cricket South Africa chief executive Gerald Majolain, ‘led directly to the intensification of opposition to apartheid around the world and contributed materially to the sports boycott that turned out to be an Achilles heel of the apartheid government..’
43 years later, it’s amazing to think how we’ve moved on. I was only talking to the President of FIFA and the England soccer captain the other day………………
RIP Basil.
