Xenophobia South Africa: Madagascar joins Zambia in football boycott

In the last three days, football friendlies with South Africa have been called off by two countries. Zambia were due to host South Africa in Lusaka on Saturday, but pulled out of the match on Tuesday in protest, citing "prevailing security concerns" following the violent attacks on foreign-owned shops in Johannesburg and Pretoria. Madagascar were lined up to replace Zambia, with the fixture to be staged in Johannesburg, but Madagascar has pulled out of playing the game, citing security reasons as well. 

In a statement, the Malagasy Football Federation said, "... after having agreed with Malagasy national institutions in particular regarding the security of the delegation of Madagascar and Malagasy nationals in South Africa, it was found necessary and judicious to decline the invitation."

South Africa's Football Federation, SAFA, tweeted earlier, "SAFA regrets to inform the public that the match between Bafana Bafana and Madagascar scheduled for this coming Saturday [Sept. 7] has been called off after the visitors [Madagascar] decided to withdraw from the encounter."

On Thursday, South Africa Football Association president Danny Jordan called for an end to the violence. He said South Africa risked being an outcast on the continent, redolent of the sports boycott under apartheid. 

“The reality is both the Zambia and Madagascar games were called off against South Africa as a result of the violence,” he said.

“As a football association, country and people, we need to confront this. What we can never do is extract ourselves from the African continent. Our destiny and our future are bound to the continent.”

SAFA spokesperson Dominic Chimhavi spoke to CNN Sport and said the players and staff were "shocked" by the news and were "still figuring what to do next."

"Apparently [Madagascar] were on their way to the airport when they received a call from the government telling them that they were not allowed to board the plane for South Africa," Chimhavi said. "Naturally this is upsetting for all involved."

"I think we both can guess why they've done this," he added. "It is pretty obvious what is happening in South Africa."

The weekend game was to be South Africa's first fixture under new coach Molefi Ntseki, but will have to wait until the October international window to make his debut. 

"The coach will have to deal with the fact that the players flew in from local and overseas-based clubs, they have been training and there must be a sense of disappointment that we could not see this team under the new coach," SAFA president Jordan said.