Namibia’s living monument
By Claudio Colombo
Among the stars of athletics, he is considered to be a gentleman. A great champion in his own right, both on and off the track, where his kind features, evident class and elegant manner of managing situations (including defeat) make him unique and inimitable. Almost a monument. Indeed: his native city has named a street after him, three kilometres which start near the centre of the city and end in the desert, running alongside the Sports Field and the airport from which flights leave for the national parks of Etosha and Namib, the skeleton coast and Swakopmund, the maritime gateway of this hard and desolate land, which is one of the thirstiest and most fascinating anywhere in the world.
We are in Windhoek, Namibia, southern Africa, on Frankie Fredericks Drive. The street dedicated in his lifetime to the most prestigious sportsman of the young African republic. It is facile, one might say, to state that Frank Fredericks is the greatest athlete his country has ever known: the history of Namibia only dates back to the day before yesterday, when a bloodless independence was won from South Africa. And yet, since that 21 March 1990 - springtime in Europe and autumn in Australia - no-one has distinguished themselves more in international sport than Frankie, becoming in the process a roving ambassador for his country. Hence the idea of the government to name after him a street in the capital (Windhoek signifies door of the wind). Here, fifty thousand houses suddenly appear amid the pale green of the hills, after endless kilometres where only sand and rocks contrast the unbelievable blue of the sky.
Windhoek is comparable to an average Italian provincial city: if you turn the clocks back thirty years. One road, Independence Avenue, splits the city centre in two. This is the road where people take a stroll, do their shopping and is home to many public buildings. Once upon a time it used to be called Kaiserstrasse, the Kaiser’s road, sign of the German domination which has left its mark on the architecture, customs and even in the language.
The Namibian government chose to honour Fredericks in September 1992, just a few days after the Barcelona Olympics, where Frankie won two silver medals, the first ever for Namibia. The area was not chosen at random: the Sports Field is the sporting area of Windhoek (if there were any doubt, the street names are there to remind you: Golf Street, Cricket Street, Tennis Street…), where better for a street dedicated to the illustrious compatriot? A little further on, as the city fades into the orange sand, signs warn motorists of danger from kudu antelope and warthogs crossing the road and you have the impression of stepping into another world.
His ties to his homeland are something that Fredericks has in his blood: there is always a party when he returns to Windhoek. What with his studies and training, he now spends much of the year in the United States, but as he approaches the end of his career he plans to come back more often and spend more time developing sports in his country. This will be no easy task, given the fragile foundations existing in this African nation.
Here, there are no avant-garde structures. Sports are one of the priorities on the agenda of the government of Sam Nujoma, but they are only really practised at any level in the German schools in the country. There is a football championship (of course, nearly all of the teams are concentrated in Windhoek), which is of a similar standard to a European third division.
Athletics? The first shoots are growing in the wake of the "Fredericks effect", but it is still early to speak of there being a true "movement". However, there is enthusiasm, as befits a young people with pride, used to surviving in this beautiful but savage and inhospitable environment. A little investment would be enough to bring out the champions of tomorrow and there is no reason why Fredericks should not spearhead a project-Nambiia to develop athletics in the country.
But, for the time being, Frankie is happy to act as an itinerant standard bearer for his country. When he goes home to his house on the hillside, he can see in the distance Fredericks Drive heading out into the desert, where kudu and warthogs roam free. A little further and there are roads named after Nelson Mandela, Robert Mugabe, the president of Zimbabwe and close ally and after Sam Nujoma, the head of state. All are alive and in office: this could well be the credo of Namibia, this country where water is more precious than gold and you don’t have to be dead to be a monument.
Claudio Colombo is a senior athletics journalist with Corriere della Sera in Italy