Presidents Report for 2017-18
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Presidents Report for 2017-18 The year under review saw a deepening of South African Sailing’s (SA Sailing) organizational capabilities and a broadening of a number of initiatives undertaken in terms of the 2015 strategy. The unanimous support in February 2018 of the updated Constitution is a significant milestone in the journey to change the business model of the national federation. 1. Professionalize Management. The Constitutional changes should bring Council closer to the clubs and sailors by conflating the intervening layer of Regional Authorities. This is done in three ways. Firstly, the Regional Chairmen are now also National Councillors so preventing the “broken telephone” syndrome of second hand messages. Secondly, there is engagement by the National Council directly with the sailors in each of the Regions in feedback meetings every four months shortly after every National Council meeting. Thirdly, the Regional Authority can now operate with a core three-person Regional Committee rather than needing to have the eight person mirror of the National Council of yester year. This should reduce the total number of people to be coordinated to a more manageable 85. The District operational structure is proving to be beneficial in both fund raising and a stronger association between the yacht clubs and their local districts and municipalities. The 2018/19 year will see a bigger focus on the national rollout of the District structures in each Region. A key concept is committee ‘work’ is reduced to a minimum. Rather than asking someone to sign up to a committee, people are asked to tackle a project they might be passionate about. Once the project is complete the individual project members are free to move on until something else takes their fancy. A company, the South African Sailing Team (Pty) Ltd (SAST), is being registered in terms of the new Constitutional provisions. This will provide a vehicle for organizing and funding elite sailors and our talented youth. This new entity, in which SA Sailing will be a minority partner, will be constituted with its own board of directors. SA Sailing will have the prerogative of appointing the chairman and a minority of the directors. The aim will be to have former Olympians on the board as well as sailors with international experience. They should be complemented by business capable individuals to provide a board with the full range of necessary skills. The first chairman of the board is David Booth. David is a CA, a successful businessman, an accomplished sailor and an internationally experienced sailing administrator. We are very fortunate he has agreed to take on the challenge of this inaugural role. Equally exciting he will be joined by Gareth Blanckenberg and Dominique Provoyeur both of whom, amongst their many accomplishments, are themselves Olympians. Further appointments will be announced in due course. This vehicle should ensure a focused effort, both operationally and financially, for our High Performance athletes. It is expected it will provide partner companies and individual funders the comfort that their contributions will, without distraction, be applied to achieving success at the highest level. The appointment of District Officers in each of the Regions is proving to be enormously successful. On a day to day basis these full time representatives are both driving the implementation of our Strategic goals and being the face of SA Sailing on the ground in the federation’s interactions with the sailing community. These colleagues are proving to be the backbone of our service offering. Further impetus to professional competence has been provided by the qualification of three additional International Judges and the training of eleven new Safety Officers accredited by the South African Maritime Safety Authority (SAMSA). Dave Hudson, Iuan Gray and Luke Scott join Lance Burger and Alan Keen as World Sailing approved IJ’s. The eleven new Safety Officers brings the total SAMSA authorized SA Sailing agents to 56 around the country. In what will be a major change a new database system has been identified to enhance the operations of SA Sailing. This system developed for the Australian sailing federation will not only enhance the services that SA Sailing can offer but could also be rolled out to our clubs and classes. Key functionality includes detailed membership management, a communication platform, an online portal for managing training and development courses, online entry for events and an integrated link to an updated website. Implementation of the system is expected to commence in August 2018. It will be offered to clubs and classes in future rollouts. 2. Growing the Base There has been important progress. A total of 159 students from 33 schools were introduced to sailing in the Learn to Sail program, 82% of them Historically Disadvantaged South Africans and 39% of them female. In addition, a total of 73 people were trained as Instructors (25), Race Coaches (11) and Safety Boat Skippers (37). In the regional interschool’s events held around the country more than 50 schools participated in various regional and district competitions. The number of participants was around 250. The Team Sailing League was launched in September 2017. The four fleets of seven boats apiece have been deployed to Midmar for the KZN region, Victoria Lake for Northern region, Imperial Yacht Club for Western Cape and North End Lake in Port Elizabeth for the Eastern Cape. This provides a zestful platform for introducing sailing as a school sport. 3. Transformation The year has been full of excitement with stirring tales of break through opportunities. As this is being written in the week celebrating Nelson Mandela’s Centenary one is reminded of one of Madiba’s trenchant observations. “What counts in life is not the mere fact that we have lived. It is what difference we have made to the lives of others” Many have responded to Madiba’s challenge. Phenomenal work is being done by dedicated people in organizations such as Sail Africa, Victoria Lake Yacht Club, the Royal Cape Yacht Club’s Sailing Academy, Mossel Bay Yacht Club, Redhouse Yacht Club, Race Ahead, Supersail Wilderness, Theewater Sailing Academy, Zeekoeivlei Sailing Centre, Zululand Yacht Club and the likes. Many heroes are emerging to join the ranks of icons such as Golden Mgedza, a key personality in the Shosholoza America’s Cup campaign, Asenathi Jim, a double Olympian and Lindani Mchunu, the irrepressible manager of the Royal Cape’s Sailing Academy. Siyanda Vato is on a two-year tutelage living abroad learning to become a navigator and performance analyst on Lord Irvine Laidlaw’s Fling boats. Lord Laidlaw’s contribution to sailing in South Africa has been phenomenal. See more on this later. Refeloa Zililo and Ayanda Ndimande from Sail Africa and Yonela Temela and Azile Arosi from Royal Cape Yacht Club sailed in the Superyacht Cup in Palma, Spain. This was made possible by Marine Inspirations, an initiative started by two South African yacht captains, Phil Wade and Anthony Just. The program gives young Black maritime students and sailors the opportunity to sail and learn about the super yacht industry. Started in 2014 it hosts Black sailors in Mallorca, the Super Yacht capital of the world. Our current Olympians Asenathi Jim, Roger Hudson and Stefano Marcia continue to re-invest in the next generation of competitive sailors. They have trained the South African teams for the two Youth Worlds that have taken place in the past twelve months. Thoughtful long term planning by Race Ahead has seen the likes of Rivaldo Arendse paired with Benji Daniels, 29er World Champion, selflessly sailing a 420 in the Youth Worlds to blood Ronaldo in the top level of international sailing at a very young age. The unsung heroes who have made the time and resources available to bring all of this about can be justifiably proud of what has been made possible. The many involved in the hard work of development sailing are surely meeting Madiba’s challenge of “making a difference” in other people’s lives. They are an inspiration to us all and should stir many more to action. 4. Access to Water Regrettably, there have been setbacks. The loss of tenure at Algoa Bay Yacht Club and Mossel Bay Yacht Club is significant. In the June newsletter I wrote, “There has been understandable concern in the yachting community in the wake of the termination of the leases of Algoa Bay Yacht Club (ABYC) and Mossel Bay Yacht Club (MBYC). Clearly this poses significant challenges for sailing and the future of yacht clubs on the South African coastline. The decisions taken by Transnet, apparently in pursuit of commercial returns on their port assets, are dreadful for our sport. Moreover, enormous collateral damage is being wreaked on nationally important transformation programmes with disastrous effects on many young lives. Transnet itself has an obligation in this area along with all thinking South Africans. “Access to water” is a cornerstone of the Five-pronged SA Sailing Strategy agreed in 2015. This was spearheaded by Mike Robinson. A great deal of work has been undertaken by Mike and others over the past three years to develop programmes and encourage reforms to meet the challenges posed by the landlord. This included getting the coastal clubs together in a seminar at Royal Cape Yacht Club (RCYC)to share experiences and advise on comprehensive strategies. Mike, Greg Smith, our former CEO, Peter Hall, Bev le Sueur, Hylton Hale, myself and others have spent considerable hours engaged with and advising clubs on what is needed. At RCYC Hylton Hale, Dave Hudson, Greg Smith and I sat on the Futures Committee for three years. At Mossel Bay Bev le Sueur has had several round table meetings separately with the Western Cape’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Sports’ (DCAS) Head Office, WC Provincial Sport Confederation, WC Minister of Sport Anroux Marais and is continuously engaged in talks with Dr Lyndon Bouah, Mr Thabo Tutu and Mr Bennett Bailey all from DCAS.