Here lies a tyrant
19 Feb 2013
MARK KEOHANE, writing in Business Day Sport Monthly, says former South African rugby chief Louis Luyt was a power-hungry egotist who did more harm than good in his role as leader.
Louis Luyt is dead but the lie that defines his legacy to the game as legendary must also be buried. He was destructive in everything he did as president of the South African Rugby Football Union (Sarfu) and motivated by his own agenda and ego and he was a risk to the future of the game.
He functioned on fiction because only he knew what was closer to fact.
This is a condemnation of Luyt the Sarfu president. It is not a reflection on his right to be respected as a father, husband and friend.
He was a crass leader who thrived on the humiliation of others and he caused pain to many people with decisions that were not based on rugby but on his own insecurity and paranoia. There can’t be reward for lacking emotional intelligence and there can never be justification for the chaos.
Luyt’s legacy was a dictatorship that threatened more than a sport’s unity. He harmed the sport and he embarrassed the sport without consequence or without remorse. He did it regularly and saw it as refusing to be intimidated.
He was a reminder of everything the world detested in apartheid South Africa but he survived on the fears of those who were uncertain about the future and ill-informed and still related to noise as leadership, when introspection and reflection were words more appropriate to change. A legacy is earned through innovation and the impact of an action; not an ability just to react.
Luyt was a fighter and his strength was based on survival. Sarfu needed calm and vision and he provided chaos and confrontation.
It suited his needs because the noise was part of the illusion that he was taking charge of rugby’s future. He was a fascinating character because of his contradictions, but he was not good for the game and he stifled progress through his inability to transform his own thinking. He was unsure about his status and he always overcompensated with boasts when unsure, be it because of lack of knowledge or because he threatened his ability to use Sarfu to define his influence in a community that used his voice when necessary but never fully endorsed him as part of the exclusive brotherhood.
This was down to class and not race. It was this lack of acceptance that tortured him. But he knew about survival because of a background that battled poverty. Wealth would also be measured on status and worth. To get there he would fight. So he fought because that meant not allowing for discussion and not risking being exposed on an intellectual level.
He was a clever man but he lacked introspection because of insecurities in not having a high schooling. It meant he only knew how to make statements.
In his world that was strength. To ask a question was to invite trouble.
Leadership is at its most seductive when those in charge can take pleasure out of another’s achievement. Luyt could never do that because he could not even take pleasure out of his own successes.
He had an incredible work ethic, which intimidated and compensated for an inability to see beyond what worked for him personally and as a leader. He also blurred the power of knowledge with the gathering of information on individuals to further entrench his presidency. He had menace when there should have been mentorship. He never made an apology for any of his actions and a man who always thinks he gets it right is a man who is rarely getting it right.
He embraced those vulnerable to his projections of strength and bullying and he never saw the contradiction in how he applied the morality of the God-fearing man and the lack of morality in his manipulation of people.
We once debated loyalty and he was absolute. People, he said, crossed him once and thought they had won. He told them to enjoy the feeling because he would make sure they spent the rest of their lives reminded of what price to pay for betrayal in loyalty.
His life was interesting but he was too preoccupied in the potential of others to be the enemy that he found a reason to justify an agenda that in turn would justify a reaction for a confrontational engagement.
His ego would never allow him modesty and he insisted he had earned the right to be called doctor. Titles and status are what he felt defined his characters. His actions were for gain. When was it ever about rugby?
His rugby world was a creation to compensate for what he felt he lacked in a personal space. He could be charming but his charm was too often determined by the personal gain. He bored easily if he was not the primary beneficiary. His mind was always busy but the intent wasn’t always flattering and he excused any criticism as a necessary to protect the game from those who didn’t understand it. He blamed the government and rugby was his status for greater acceptance in an Afrikaans elite that would never see him as their equal.
The bully was his default mechanism and if he was full of bravado he didn’t have to front his fears of being inferior. He did not trust anyone but celebrated just how many enemies he had. Enemies caused fear. Friends could only cause confusion.
He was convinced he needed no one to survive but he never understood that to survive is not to necessarily inspire. Not that it would have been a consideration. He was angry that he was disliked although he denied it and there was an element in him that deliberately added to the dislike. The man who made rugby his kingdom was always aware that the boy in him wanted acknowledgement and reward.
He never found his place in South African society and always felt he had been short-changed. If he wasn’t getting the recognition then why would he celebrate anyone else.
He took nothing from the game unless he was the beneficiary. He justified everything in the name of Springbok rugby and the Afrikaans culture and he manipulated the game that represented the culture more than a sport. Where most would find a smile he found suspicion.
I liked him but he was not happy.
I always got the feeling he wouldn’t even allow for that because that could be an admission he had not won.
He was always in conflict and his tenure was about fighting whoever he felt provided a cover to the real issue, which was his insecurity.
He took but he gave little.
It is one thing to preach from a self-made pedestal but a leader of men is also an inspiration to the very men he leads.
He wanted mystique but then couldn’t resist telling you what he had done for South African rugby. He created an identity he believed would give him acceptance and he alienated every dominating personality.
He was a preacher of what he wanted portrayed, yet the intention to be liked and revered was not something he could ask for, so as he lost a disciple who realised the legend is what makes the man but the actions of the man that confirms the flaws in the legend.
If the game was his passion and the future of the game was his only concern we would be talking about his vision, his succession plan and his leadership.
The story would be of the guy who turned rags into silk but knew God. It is embarrassing. The only thing he gave rugby was conflict and blood. He adopted a militant style approach in which he spoke and never allowed for a response.
He stripped players of power and humiliated them and threatened their futures in the media. In a country where fear and conflict were positives that someone was in charge, he put himself in charge of the game and was never asked what he was actually going to do to make it the game for all South Africans.
He used the divide and rule among blacks and whites because he recognised weakness in an individual and played the vulnerabilities to facilitate whatever outcome that comes with uncertainty.
He took Nelson Mandela and the government to court to prove he was still a white Afrikaner who would not be intimidated by the black government.
He made sure it was a page one report.
He did it, he said, to show Afrikaners still had a voice and still had fight. He then used rugby as the punching bag.
He used culture, white fears and black unknowns to have so many applauding his strengths. But it was never about resolution or calm. It was about conflict and chaos because when there is no fight then there is usually reflection. In a fight there is only time to react.
Luyt’s legacy conflicts with every single entity that makes up the fabric of the game. He took the game he supposedly loved and made it his own game. He was an untouchable because he manipulated the executive structure – and when fear no longer sufficed neither did his games inspire even laughter.
He still couldn’t see the moral crime in subjecting Mandela to take the witness stand. He claimed victory but it also confirmed stupidity.
He tried so hard to create an identity of the Lions but he was a railway clerk whose arrogance and defiance was a misrepresentation of the culture whose silence he interpreted as a fight.
He fired by fax and turned the most disgraceful of acts into a kind of legend which applauded a man who was prepared to make the hard calls. All he knew was hardship and that is all he gave back to South African rugby.
It is disgusting that he was allowed to operate in such isolation and as a law unto himself. He clearly had a mind that favoured his own survival but emotional intelligence is the result of an environment and tutorship and being taught, not self-taught.
He never added value to the game’s evolution. There is no legacy to applaud. His rugby administration was a contradiction. Morality was as interpretive as was loyalty and betrayal.
Rugby was the platform for Luyt to turn a lost soul into a tortured one and he tried to make everyone believe that his soul knew only sacrifice.
He was a sad man because not only did he derive pleasure at the expense of others but the ultimate humiliation was of his own doing because his identity and influence believed there was substance to his existence, but he could never get what he thought was a show of strength. And arrogance was ignorance and in degrees of ignorance the worst form is when there is a belief that all the ugly qualities that make a leader uninspiring are presented as strengths of a no-nonsense leader.
Luyt did not entertain minds that would expose the limitations of his own and it is one thing to fight but another to succeed without a fight.
A day before his death no one cared for his rants. A day after the myth is magnified. The platitudes have been predictable and inoffensive but the inane nature is more insult than compliment to the King of Ellis Park and self-proclaimed King of the Rugby Jungle.
In death he did no evil. In life he only knew evil.
Luyt’s final act as South African rugby chief was to embarrass the intellect and integrity of Afrikaans-speaking South Africans who are excited by inclusion on the world map and not offended that it was not listed as the chosen planet.
The good doctor was so insecure at what he hadn’t experienced because of his environment that he believed titles would create the illusion of intelligence and that fear was just another way of making sure no one disputed he was the boss.
His decision to humiliate one of the world’s saints was the act of a sinner; alternatively a man who was showing his lack of class, education and upbringing. His attempts to justify his action and his conviction in doing so belong on The Jerry Springer Show.
He always spoke of not needing to be popular and then he found something in popularity that he sold to himself as weakness.
Come to think of it, he rarely spoke about what was good for South African rugby. He always spoke about what he was doing for South African rugby and he created the chaos and never had time to explain what it was that kept him so busy. He didn’t give South African rugby professionalism. He didn’t care. In the last few years all he did was condemn the government. He manipulated the weakness in rugby’s administration to impress his strength.
He was an impostor as a leader and the game deserved so much more. Luyt, when he lived, benefited from the illusion of his leadership.
Don’t allow the lie to continue.
– This article first appeared in the March issue of Business Day Sport Monthly, which is distributed FREE with the newspaper on the second last Friday of every month.
748 Comments
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19 Feb 2013, 11:58 am
@victoriabok-49: If the shoe fits wear it … if you are the type of Afrikaner the world detests then leave. If you are the type of Afrikaner that inspires and is embraced then hopefully you stay to inspire. Equally for the English speaking tosser who is racist and robust in his belief that he is superior to anything and everything. He can leave immediately. For the one who is challenging of his own view and challenges mine … now that kind of visitor can stay.
19 Feb 2013, 11:58 am
@stormersboy-241:
It is known (as I am sure you know) that a number of corporations specifically employ psychopaths in positions of power or leadership roles for specific leadership skills all psychopaths show.
There are 8 main characteristics of these ‘corporate’ or business psychopaths and if we weight them up against someone like Luyt, he ticks quite a number of these boxes I believe
Glibness/superficial charm
Grandiose sense of self-worth
Pathological lying
Cunning/manipulative
Lack of remorse or guilt
Emotionally shallow
Callous/lack of empathy
Failure to accept responsibility for own actions
What is interesting is how some of these individuals can separate these traits in their business life, and personal life – making them solid family men or women with good morals and values.
19 Feb 2013, 11:59 am
@gunther-238: ????? Honestly?????
19 Feb 2013, 11:59 am
@The Sharks rugby pedigree is packaged as dog food-249: I expect that there would be major pressure on SAPS to get this one right.
i was taking a walk up Lions head this morning (don’t ask) with a bunch of mates and they all agreed that they were captivated by this story. It seems to have latched on to the psyche of South Africans like i haven’t seen before. World wide even.
19 Feb 2013, 12:00 pm
@The Rangerman-51: Can you please articulate in a written piece that I will publish as to the detail of all the good he did in rugby. Keo@keo.co.za
19 Feb 2013, 12:00 pm
@PissAnt-252: Brilliant. Same for sportsmen……
Some can split the facets, some are unable.
19 Feb 2013, 12:02 pm
@The Sharks rugby pedigree is packaged as dog food-256:
Lance Armstrong a perfect case study.
Ruthless, lying, manipulative in the sports world, but also established one of the biggest non-profit organisations fighting cancer.
19 Feb 2013, 12:03 pm
@keo-251: He is not called Victoria because of his crossdressing tendencies. He is a shining beacon in Victoria Canada.
19 Feb 2013, 12:03 pm
@The Sharks rugby pedigree is packaged as dog food-249: self defence? not on your nelly – got someone trapped in the sh.itte.r you don’t need no defending.
Booze/drugs – sorry, but they are aggravating circumstances.
Why would she feel the need to lock herself in there in the 1st place? This is the question that needs answering but we’ll only ever hear a conjecture on that. Sure as hell he ain’t gonna jump up like a dunce and admit his liability.
He’s admitted shooting her so intent is pretty much all that’s left on the table.
19 Feb 2013, 12:04 pm
@PissAnt-252: that devil Jurie Roux ticks all of those boxes.
19 Feb 2013, 12:04 pm
@keo-251: Embraced? Leave that moffie kak in CT please
19 Feb 2013, 12:08 pm
@PissAnt-252: Of the four styles of leadership Luyt would qualify as dictatorial. In this instance the leader makes all the important decisions. These are usually task centred. Staffs are expected to implement them. It allows no room to question these decisions. Rules through force and fear. This style can be very effective in a crisis or when leadership is lacking in others. It is destructive in other contexts though.
19 Feb 2013, 12:08 pm
@keo-212:
Ha wouldn’t surprise me with all the stuff in the papers re fixed football/ cricket matches etc what a shambles
19 Feb 2013, 12:08 pm
@WhatIf-60: Thank you for having the insight and appreciation to get exactly what the article is about and the motivation in challenging the myth. Every single comment here has attacked me as a person and my character based on my view of Luyt, but those doing the attacking never worked with him or interacted with him on a professional basis. But they have an entrenched view of how good a rugby administrator he was? Based on what?
19 Feb 2013, 12:08 pm
@RL-260:
Haha – could well be but I have seen more positive changes in SA Rugby since he joined a couple of years ago than in the last 10 years.
19 Feb 2013, 12:08 pm
@Dilligafrican-259: We know it’s bullshyte. But this is what his advocate has to do, if he wants to throw in any form of defence.
He has to get the unlawfullness out of what Oscar has not denied doing (killing) the equation……How he does this is where it gets interesting.
@PissAnt-257: Indeed. Many of Nike’s athletes as we chatted about last night. Woods, Armstrong and co.
19 Feb 2013, 12:10 pm
On a side note it appears Mr Bean has been elected president of Armenia.
19 Feb 2013, 12:11 pm
Are you still here piepie joller in a tea cup or you also walking out in a huge huff of Huffington proportions of indignation and self opinionated righteousness like some the poor hard done by indignant righteous idiots taking themselves as seriously as morons such as you do?
19 Feb 2013, 12:12 pm
@PissAnt-252: We call them sociopaths
Yes. In my corporate career in Banking I have met and dealt with many of them (captains of industry). They share many similar characteristics, but the one most obvious one is a determination to achieve whatever they are wanting to at the time, often regardless of consequence. They are extremely open about their self interest and this is often what sets them apart from the average. They don’t care that people may judge them for their ambition, many repress that out of fear of condemnation.
They key is to understand the motives that drive them, and how to tap into that.
In short, my strategy was to change my mindset when considering what type of business I was in. Not the money business, but the ego and expectation business. Once i figured that out the clients used to love me. Still do to this day. (I send them birthday wishes in spite of not being in the business anymore, and know that if I need to call them about something they will take my call).
19 Feb 2013, 12:12 pm
This is hardly revolutionary news – the title pretty much sums it up – but funny how time marches on and how insignificant it all becomes.
19 Feb 2013, 12:12 pm
@Dilligafrican-259: He is not going to be able to shake himself of the ‘intent’ – and Barry Roux shouldn’t even waste time there… He intended to kill who was behind that door – the end.
A room 1.4 x 1.4, a locked door and a person behind….3 shots through that door – thats intent to kill…..not negligence. Any murder is either or: intentional or negligent.
He’s going to pull one of the negate unlawfullness aspect tricks.
19 Feb 2013, 12:13 pm
What’s also interesting about Oscars actions, if he’s claiming he suspected burglars, is that he never called to find out if Reeva was safe, when she wasn’t in bed, before opening fire. That would be the first thing anyone would do.
19 Feb 2013, 12:17 pm
@skopdiekan-268: That’s the way Petal. Don’t take yourself seriously. A cup of dandelion tea, a tofu sandwich and a wee lie down will have right as ninepence in a jiffy.
19 Feb 2013, 12:17 pm
@David-272: or maybe he thought the Cupid thing with bow and arrows was a bit outdated and went 21st century on it.
19 Feb 2013, 12:19 pm
So Keo condemns Luyt’s lack of inclusiveness,
his HR skills,
and almost EVERTHING else about the man, that can be said in 3000 words or less.
All justified by the phrase…………………………….”It’s good to have an opinion, voice yours”.
Anyone else see the irony?
19 Feb 2013, 12:19 pm
@PissAnt-252:
Hasnt Paddy Upton come out with a book that outlines this very subject?
19 Feb 2013, 12:20 pm
@stormer in a teacup-262:
Dictators are fascinating. In history most dictators were actually elected through some democratic system, or the manipulation of a democratic system.
So they have a sense of charm, definite sense of self-worth, little to no remorse or empathy, are extremely manipulative and even when the **** hits the fan, still believed that their way was the right way so never accepting responsibility for failures.
That is about all those boxes ticked.
19 Feb 2013, 12:20 pm
@stormer in a teacup-273: and don’t forget one teaspoon of tik
19 Feb 2013, 12:20 pm
“Every single comment here has attacked me as a person and my character based on my view of Luyt” – I did nothing of the kind !!!
19 Feb 2013, 12:20 pm
Those believing me to be anti Afrikaans, consider this: I speak fluent Afrikaans, love the language, went to an Afrikaans junior school in which I was the only English speaking in the sports teams, spent four years post school in the Police, was among the youngest Detective Warrant Officers in the country at 19 and played for Police under 21 rugby … again the only English speaking in the squad. I grew up in Durbanville, the Northern Suburbs of the Cape, the son of a Dad from Doncaster in the North of England and a New Zealand Mom whose Dad was Maori and Mom was European. I consider myself blessed and privileged for all the experiences and cultural influence. I married into a home where the father is German and the mother Afrikaans. The Ouma to my kids is Afrikaans and there is a huge emphasis on them speaking both languages fluently. If you want to take a pot at me do so but take an informed one.
I criticised Luyt’s rugby administration because of how he operated; not based on the fact that he was Afrikaans. Hoskins is English-speaking and he has failed the game as much as Luyt did as president, but Hoskins does not have the malice, vanity and insecurity that came packaged with Luyt’s dictatorship.
I would also challenge those who are challenging me about the class distinction within the Afrikaans community; of how the very affluent and influential and educated Afrikaans community view and viewed Afrikaans speaking communities from the Railways, who lacked educated (for whatever reason). Luyt came from one side of the tracks and wanted the world the other offered. His fighting qualities are endorsed and emphasised but he fought for his own acceptance into a world and used rugby to get that but was never given it. He was misguided in taking Mandela to court because it represented to him the fight for the white Afrikaner’s voice, but the white Afrikaner who fought and embraced change was disgusted that this man believed he spoke on their behalf. That is the essence of the piece.
19 Feb 2013, 12:20 pm
@stormersboy-269:
What business are you in now?
19 Feb 2013, 12:20 pm
Arseholes that think they’re such upstanding morally objective beacons of righteousness that the majority of schmucks who actually think their righteous indignation means anything worthwhile to anyone at all.
Big f’ng hoo ha about f’all and they still want to parade about how hurt their poor indignation feels while they huff the fck outa here.
19 Feb 2013, 12:21 pm
@stormersboy-269:
That is why industry specifically employ them, they are ruthless. But they also often self-destruct.
19 Feb 2013, 12:22 pm
@John Galt-276:
No book yet, but since he is in that industry (sport) his take will be fascinating.
19 Feb 2013, 12:23 pm
It seems Nair is asking Nel why there is no certificate from the Director of the NPA re: scheduling of the charge……
1st Statefuckup possibly? Irritated that he is being asked to decide on scheduling….
19 Feb 2013, 12:24 pm
@John Galt-276:
Another guy you can tap into on this subject is Tom Dawson-Squibb, he is part of Headstart sport.
19 Feb 2013, 12:24 pm
@David-272:
The blood stained cricket bat , (if it exists), kind of rules out the burglary thing.
Things look bad for Oscar.
For his own sake, and all others suffering from this tragedy……………………………………………he should just tell the truth.
19 Feb 2013, 12:24 pm
@The Sharks rugby pedigree is packaged as dog food-271: @David-272:
Perhaps the events unfolding as follows:
R goes to bathroom. While there an sms comes in. The cellphone either vibrates or makes the noise for incoming sms. O hears this and given the time of the day, reaches over to see who it is from.
Upon reading the sms, he loses it. Upon her returning to the room he says: what is this? Pointing to the phone and fires 1st shot. Her survival instinct kicks in and run to the toilet, probably thinking that he will calm down.
But he now follows her there, and given the size of the room knows that a few shots will get her. A further 3 or 4 shots were fired. I would think at different angles.
So the trigger was anger. We know that he had anger management issues which at its root is fear. Fear of being betrayed, fear of being ridiculed and so on. The fear when fermented became anger.
19 Feb 2013, 12:25 pm
@keo-280: so when can we expect your 1st piece of writing in the moedertaal? (you can add the english version below for our international vermin..sorry friends..
19 Feb 2013, 12:26 pm
Is not the psychopath one of god’s creatures too? Afterall what did the saviour say about turning the other cheekie?
19 Feb 2013, 12:26 pm
@cane-287:
Its interesting nobody istalking about the cricket bat.
@Sheriff-288:
Agreed her phone records might hold the key.
19 Feb 2013, 12:28 pm
Schedule 6.
Boom!
Just got real.
Oscar better get a Mr Delivery menu.
19 Feb 2013, 12:28 pm
Nair rules a Schedule 6 case…………..
Bail almost impossible?
19 Feb 2013, 12:28 pm
280 ja keo and u forgot to mention you are a great bulls fan.
19 Feb 2013, 12:28 pm
Schedule six called by nair
19 Feb 2013, 12:29 pm
@cab-294:
Everyone is entitled to one vice or bad judgement call.
We will let that one slide
19 Feb 2013, 12:29 pm
You still here pisswilly fckface thinking your highfalutin opinionated idiocy representing reason or you f ‘ng off with the rest of the poor hurt souls whose self righteous indignation is so sorely tested for moral values?
F ‘ng d ‘ckhead and this little piepie joller punky boy up your f ‘all in a tea cup backside
19 Feb 2013, 12:30 pm
@cane-275: cane I say anything about anyone and hide behind the opinion shield – no facts no context needed ……
That’s is just my opinion though.
19 Feb 2013, 12:31 pm
If there was a bat it would have been mentioned this morning imo.
19 Feb 2013, 12:31 pm
While we are all entitled to our opinions I feel that this article is a cheap shot at a man who did what he believed was the best for SA Rugby (and himself of course!) and is no longer here to defend himself against this trashy, shoddy and unprofessional piece of journalism.
I wait with baited breath to see if Keohane has the balls and decency to answer the now-departed UFO’s very valid points and criticism (in particular #28 but more sadly #66 where he announced his departure from this CTCC).
Go well UFO, I enjoyed your posts tremendously and take you to be an honest and truthful man.
Mark, your website advertises “Daily rugby news from SA and the rest of the world,” yet you chose to wait 18 days before you even acknowledged a (like-him-or-not) great yet controversial rugby administrator’s passing, and I would like to know the reasons why, please.
P.S.. CTCC = CuntToCuntChatline
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