South Africa declared the creation of a "non-racial democracy" back in 1994 after the country's first all-race election was held. Nelson Mandela became state president, and apartheid was consigned to the dustbin of history.

But a South African obsession with race continues to raise its head in the most archaic ways, threatening to undermine the ideals of the country dubbed the Rainbow Nation by Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu. And this weekend South Africa faces a furore over a race, rugby and politics row which erupted when a newspaper ran a story under the headline: "Watson is black."

The subject of the headline - 23-year-old Luke Watson - is, by any tests of the late, unlamented, apartheid-era Race Relations Board, white. Very white. He is also captain of the Cape Stormers, one of South Africa's Super 14 rugby union competition teams, playing as a flanker.

Most rugby fans in the Western Cape, the home of the Stormers, believe Watson should be a Springbok - a South African rugby international. The rest of the country is fairly indifferent, believing South Africa is blessed with many flankers - of every skin hue - who are better than Watson.

The Springboks' coach, Jake White, who will lead the South Africans to the Rugby World Cup in France this year, last week judged that Watson was not good enough to be part of his 45-man training squad. But the absence of Watson from the squad triggered a political eruption and race-based squabble of volcanic proportions.

Mike Stofile, deputy president of the South African Rugby Union (Saru) and brother of the country's sports minister, Makhenkesi Stofile of the African National Congress (ANC), said Watson should be in the Springbok squad. He gave as his reason the fact that 31 years ago the flanker's father, Dan Cheeky' Watson, turned down the chance of a Springbok cap, at a time when top-class rugby was whites-only. Instead, he chose to play rugby for a black township team called Kwaru, outside Port Elizabeth. Then somebody - presumably a government hit squad or a white extremist - burned down Watson's clothing factory.

All this, naturally, made Cheeky a hero among a black population which, at that time, was heavily oppressed and deprived of political rights.

Stofile, backed by his sports minister brother in a statement in parliament, insisted Luke Watson be added to the Springbok squad against the wishes of the national coach, who traditionally in all countries chooses his own players.

Stofile, who would definitely be classified "black" if a Race Classification Board still existed, urged his two fellow Saru administrators, who would likely be classified "coloured" (mixed race) not to allow Luke Watson to suffer because of his father's "struggle credentials". Then, without telling White, they added Watson's name to the 45 chosen by the coach and his two selectors.

Stopping short of calling White a racist, Stofile said: "Cheeky Watson was one of us, fighting for the liberation of this country. We cannot have a situation where those children get victimised because of their parents' actions."

As the row broadened beyond rugby to the state of South Africa race relations, Ebrahim Rasool, premier of the government of the Western Cape, Luke Watson's home province, joined in and said Watson should be regarded as a black player with a right to play in the Springbok team ahead of any white players of equivalent talent.

In a newspaper article under the headline "Watson is black", Rasool said: "Given where he comes from, and where his father deliberately chose to play his rugby, on the dusty, potholed fields of the Eastern Cape townships, Luke comes from a historically disadvantaged community. Jake White shouldn't be looking at Watson as a white player. If there are white flankers of equal ability, then Luke should get the nod because of his family's history."

In "non-racial" South Africa, race classification remains at the heart of the country's economic policy. Under its strategy of post-apartheid affirmative action and Black Economic Empowerment (BEE), companies qualify to apply for necessary government contracts only if they have scored points on an incredibly complex range of criteria based on the differential treatment of "blacks", "coloureds", "Indians" and "women" regarding education, placement in managerial positions, sale of cheap equity and so on.

Under BEE, many senior ANC officials have become billionaires in an incredibly short period of time, while the majority of the poor have remained poor. How the ANC government classifies people racially in the absence of a Race Classification Board is mysterious, and John Kane-Berman, chief executive of the South African Institute of Race Relations, said: "Sooner or later parliament or the Constitutional Court will have to determine the criteria upon which South Africans will once again be racially classified.

"Those Constitutional Court judges will not relish deciding a man's race. Without legislation to guide them, they would have to rely on precedent, which would mean looking up relevant judicial decisions in terms of the previous whites-only apartheid government's racial laws."

As the whole country argues about the Watson controversy, Jake White has kept quiet. He has to reduce his squad to 30 tomorrow. The Saru administrators have warned him that if Luke Watson is not in the 30 he will be sacked.

Of the 46 players in White's training squad, 14 are so-called "players of colour" - 15 if Watson is classified black.