Samoan rugby team to visit South Africa

Press, 1 February 1986, Page 1

Samoan rugby team to visit South Africa

NZPA special correspondent Apia, Western Samoa The Western Samoa Rugby Union Association has announced that it has accepted an invitation to tour South AfriCa,in AprilMay this year. The invitation, extended by David Lord, a South African supporter in Sydney, carried full sponsorship of the tour, amounting to $250,000, said die union yesterday. The union reached its decision at a meeting -earlier this week chaired by its president, the leader of the Christian Democratic ,i Party and Minister of Public Works, Mr Tupuola Efi. The union said that the lack of an invitation to the World Cup in New Zealand and Australia in March, 1987, played a big part , in its decision to go to South Africa. The team will play nine matches, including two

tests with the Springboks. The secretary to the mother union, Mr George Meredith, said that its not being invited to the World Cup, when Fiji and Tonga were both invited, was insulting. He blamed New Zealand and Australia, whom he said had been “pushing against us.” "We are being neglected by New Zealand and Australia,” he said. “We are not invited to the World Cup, but Fiji and Tonga are both in.” Mr Meredith said that in spite of efforts to get invitations to play in New Zealand and Australia, “we have never been invited." On South Africa’s apartheld system of government, Mr Meredith said: “If it’s the colour of the skin you're worried about, well, that’s exactly what New Zealand and Australia are doing to us.”