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DEVFXOPMENT AND PROMOllON The following proposals were made to help develop and promote table tennis in other areas. 1. A group of players could arrange a visit to areas where there are players interested in developing the game. Eg. Vredendal, Atlantis, Malmesbury, etc. These visits could perhaps be arranged for the off season. 2. A one day tournament could be arranged in areas where tournaments are not normally held. 3. A special team competition could be arranged which would be held at 3 central venues, one each in Boland, Western Province and Malmesbury. The teams would then travel for 2 weeks out of 3. Boland and Western Province are to investigate the possibility of setting this up. 4. Exhibitions 5. Going for weekends to Uitenhage, South Cape. 6. It was proposed that a calender be drawn up setting out the dates of all these event and including normal events on the table tennis calender. 7. It was proposed that the next tournament be held in George. The meeting suggested that a convenor for this tournament be found as soon as possible. The Federation executive was given a mandate to select a steering committee to start organising this tournament immediately. It was also emphasised that this tourna ment will involve a lot of organisation and that everyone would have to pull their weight. 8. Another proposal was that a SATTF team be chosen at the next South African Tournament. They could then be sent on an exhibition tour. 9. It was felt that the standard of umpiring had to be raised. This could be accomplished by setting up an internal exam. The emphasis should initially be on practical orientation. Interested persons could first officiate at club matches, then provincial matches before progressing to national level. This practical experience could be supplemented by theory and exams. 10. The Federation would introduce a new system of grading tournaments. CONCLUSION Unless there is an all out effort by all to promote the game as envisaged, grassroots and those players that follow will encounter tremendous problems in terms of standards and policy. Our tasks this year covers a vast area. There are the coaching schemes, newsletters and so on still to be tackled, as well as our national tournament (1993) scheduled to take place in Pacaltsdorp and George during the September holiday. TENNIS UNITY TALKS Between December 1990 and September 1991 three tennis controlling bod ies were engaged in discussions about unity. Two of these organisations, each with a definable and verifiable constituency. The S.A.Tennis Union (SATU) and the Tennis Association of S.A. (TASA) can claim to be truly national, while the third. Tennis Federation of S.A. (TFSA), more than two years later still cannot present any proof that it, too, is a national body. In fact, some areas which they claimed as part of their phantom constituency have now been revealed to be either without any infrastructure at all, or are totally ignorant of TFSA. No wonder Moss Mashishi of TFSA and the NSC’s watch dog at the discussions said at our last meeting that they “do not want to discuss (their) constituency”. (August 1992) Yet, up to October 1991, it incurred a massive loss of R140 000 since 1988. It is important to note that TFSA is an offshoot of the S.A.National Tennis Union, an affiliate of SATU! It made its sudden and unheralded appearance on the sports scene together with the NSC. This was no mere coincidence. At our first discussion TFSA tried to smuggle Cheryl Roberts of Table Tennis renown into the talks between TASA and TFSA, Krish Mackerduj of Cricket, was presented as chairperson. Mashishi of the NSC was then co-opted as an Executive member, and thus became part of the TFSA team. Between December 1990 and 21 September 1991 TASA, SATU and TFSA were involved in discussions about unity and by real consensus reached agreement on, inter alia, a draft constitution embodying the principle of participatory democracy; basic principles on which merging should take place (non-racialism, in a non-racial democracy etc.); merit-selection; the redressing of imbalances; the creation of a development trust fund; acceptance of the international sports moratorium, subject to reviewal from time to time, etc. Delegates from each body attended the International Tennis Federation (ITF) conference in July 1991. To the utter dismay of the TASA delegates, a letter dated 16 April 1991, and signed by Johan Barnard, President of SATU, was to be tabled at that conference. In it SATU pleaded for its suspension to be lifted; this, after all three bodies issued a joint statement, prior to their departure, that membership of the ITF was NOT the reason for attending the conference, and declaring that they were in the process of forming a new body. At the first meeting of the Interim committee after the ITF conference, TFSA and SATU, BY MAJORITY CONSENSUS, agreed to form a new body - TENNIS SOUTH AFRICA - despite the fact that issues vital to the formation of a new body had still to be finalised, inter alia, certain vital articles in the draft constitution; the number of provinces and the delimitation of the country into provinces; the logistics for merging; and the registration and operation of the trust fund. “Money is available, conditional upon TSA being formed”. These words o f Chris Ngcoho, identified hy the Press 3 months earlier as the President-elect o f the new body, sum up the motivation for unification. Months later it was discovered that at that moment - TFSA - had run up a loss o f R140 000 during nearly 3 years with nothing to show; and its partner, SATU, was in the process o f posting a record deficit ofR2,4m. An 'Mashishi of the NSC, (someone who has never played tennis before, according to a tennis magazine) added: “ There are deadlines to be met ” to explain the urgency o f “unification From the discussion at that meeting, the following information emerged: TFSA and SATU had held various secret meetings; they had concluded agreements with the Association of Tennis Professional Tennis players (ATP) to stage two tournaments; they had decided to lift the moratorium unilaterally; that despite all the outstanding issues, they would pursue the formation of TSA with immediate effect. Later we discovered that SATU had to pay a lobola (dowry) of R500 000 to TFSA. A third of this sell-out price was afterwards used to upgrade facilities at KwaThema. Anthony Knight, an illustrator, describes this episode in a tennis magazine, as follows: “When we (he and international press) arrived at KwaThema for the opening, there was no net, no lines, just weeds. The complex was surrounded by poverty. Then under the grandstand there was champagne flowing for the media. TSA hurled 3 boxes o f tennis balls into the air, and it was chaos. There were 300 kids in the grandstand, and since they didn 't have rackets, they played football with the balls”. Sponsorships amounting to R8m became available from Standard Bank, Altech and the Regime in order to host 2 tournaments for the international tennis mercenaries in 1991. In 1992, however, only one such tourna ment could be held. Because of a salary-bill of R24 000 per month, the huge cost of accommodating the massive bureaucracy etc. TSA had to “sell the S.A. Open to Asia” for R3m, i.e. the rights to stage such a tournament under the auspices of the ATP were sold to a consortium of Asian businessmen in Hong Kong. Other interesting disclosures are: Ngcobo and Mashishi ‘earn’ R134 000 and R80 000 annually for part-time ‘jobs’; SATU in 1991 mismanaged a R2,4m sponsorship from Panasonic for DEVELOPMENT and a tournament; and, theSA. Women’s Open tournament had to be cancelled in 1992 because they could find no sponsor. THE SITUATION AS OF NOW SATU and TFSA are still functioning as separate entities in the ‘unified’ TSA. This effectively means that whereas there were 2 bodies before 1988, and 3 since then, there are now 4! TFSA still has no national constituency. People who have absconded from TASA preferred joining the SATU bodies directly despite a TSA injunction that TASA members can join TSA only via TFSA. 5>1C05 lOTHBGM REPORT-58 In the Western Provinces clubs followed Mrs L Clarke into a (‘no-name brand tennis body’) - the Ad-hoc Tennis League Committee. This piqued the WP Tennis Federation because they needed those who defected from our ranks to give some ‘body’ to their constituency. The latest information is that all differences were patched up and there is a new body called Tennis Western Province comprising the SATU WP affiliate, Tennis Federation WP. and those who formed the no-name brand tennis body. Interesting, but by no means surprising, is that Mr Colin Clarke who absconded from TASA without a single explanation 13 months ago, has now joined forces with what he disparagingly called the establishment. In Durban Southern Natal suspended their membership of TASA and are, to all intents and purposes, part of the SATU Natal. However, Natal North, now nearly 2 years old, serves an area stretching from Stanger and the Midlands down to Umzinto and Bizana in the south. COACHING PROGRAMME:- The TASA National coaching programme has since 1987 been confined to the preparation of tennis coaches at 3 levels, namely Beginners, Intermediate and Advance levels. The coaches courses, since its inception, has been sponsored by Dunlop, but sadly Dunlop has withdrawn their sponsorship for 1993. The courses have been conducted by our coaches, Mr D A Samaai, Mr B Isaacs and Mr C Bergman who has defected to the Tennis Federation of SA.