At first blush, it looked like a delegation without tour protesters.
The impression was magnified by anti-apartheid activist John Minto when he bleated about wanting to go to Nelson Mandela’s funeral in South Africa – but only if he went with the official delegation.
We all remember Minto, of course, as a protest leader against the South African rugby tour in the 1981 and – since then – as a protester against anything that calls for someone to bellow into a bullhorn.
He is reported to have said John Key’s delegation should include him or an anti-apartheid activist MP like Mana’s Hone Harawira or Green Party’s Kevin Hague.