McKenzie warns Soweto derby organisers over safety failures

Sport, arts and culture minister Gayton McKenzie has warned Stadium Management SA that its officials could be arrested if safety problems return at the Soweto derby between Orlando Pirates and Kaizer Chiefs.

Pirates will host Chiefs at FNB Stadium on October 31, with tickets released to the general public selling out in less than a day on Wednesday.

The fixture has been troubled in recent seasons by poor crowd and traffic control, fake tickets, unsafe entry and seating arrangements, and overcrowding. McKenzie says the risks to supporters must not be allowed to continue.

“Whenever there is the derby, there is chaos,” he said at a press conference in Pretoria on Wednesday focused on the implementation of video assistant referee (VAR).

“We are in discussions with Stadium Management SA [the company that runs FNB Stadium] because it must not happen again in the next derby and I told them to get their act together.

“I have reported the police because there was no police presence at the last derby and this cannot be. I highlighted this to the police minister and all the mistakes that were there.”

McKenzie previously described the Soweto derby in March as an accident waiting to happen. He compared the football experience with the Springboks’ match against the All Blacks at a packed FNB Stadium in September, where no safety or access problems were reported.

“How do you go to a rugby match with your children and they can go and buy a drink on their own and nobody [comes to take] their seats?” he said.

“With football, you will even be stabbed if you tell people, ‘I am sitting here with my kids’. This is because there are tsotsis with no tickets who intimidate people who have valid tickets.

“People can’t go to football and find people sitting on their seat numbers. When they tell them, ‘I am sitting here’, they are threatened with knives and that cannot be allowed.”

Several difficulties at recent derbies have been linked to the early problems associated with a new digital ticketing system introduced to prevent the use of fake tickets.

McKenzie said he had made his position clear to Stadium Management SA.

“I told Stadium Management SA I’ll get them arrested if they can’t keep our people safe and I want to make that one clear,” he said.

“You have the same amount of people at rugby and football matches but there is chaos at the football match. I am highly annoyed.”

The minister said he had witnessed the consequences of the failures himself, including an elderly woman being pushed against a gate.

“We can’t put people’s lives at risk. I saw an old lady pressed against the gate and she told me this has been happening for more than 30 years.

“She said ‘If I die, I die’ and I told her you don’t need to die at a soccer game.”