The Real Losers Of The World Cup?

By Barry Black.

The world watches on.

More than half the earth’s pop­u­la­tion will tune in to watch or listen to the World Cup, from New York to Sydney and Lon­don to Beijing. The world’s star­lets dis­play their skills as all set out to prove they’re the best. The cam­eras show off the glitzy new sta­dia of the host coun­try. As the world focuses on South Africa this year, it will be no dif­fer­ent. Con­sid­er­ing the joy and hap­pi­ness it brings and the rev­enue it pro­duces, it can’t be a bad thing, can it?

The South African Gov­ern­ment has inves­ted £3.1 bil­lion or $4.5 bil­lion in this tour­na­ment, build­ing new sta­dia and city squares where fans can con­greg­ate to watch their her­oes play with their nations’ hopes and shirts on their backs, the South African gov­ern­ment has spent mil­lions upon mil­lions improv­ing trans­port net­works and mod­ern­ising cit­ies where the news cam­eras will be. This sounds like a good and respons­ible gov­ern­ment get­ting its coun­try ready for its sum­mer of fame, doesn’t it?

In a nation where 47.1% of people are in poverty, 54% of cit­izens have not received an adequate edu­ca­tion, where crime stat­ist­ics, espe­cially those for rape, are among the worst in the world and where the aver­age life expect­ancy is fifty, is there no bet­ter way to spend £3.1 billion?

Soc­cer City in Johan­nes­burg , where the final will be held, has had a major re-modelling includ­ing a new sta­dium, big screens and fan zones through­out This is what the city needs, right?

Wrong. This city’s annual murder rate is around 5,000; the rape rate is double that. With a lit­er­acy rate of over 50%, this city does not need a multi-million pound soc­cer city — it needs more police, bet­ter schools and decent hous­ing. The world has decided to endorse a nation like this? A nation which has inves­ted more in a soc­cer city than it has in health­care since 2008?

How many times dur­ing the tour­na­ment will the cam­eras wheel away from the glitz and glam­our of the new com­plexes, new sta­dia and new gov­ern­ment build­ings to show us what this nation’s prob­lems really are? None, is my guess.

So, as you watch this sum­mer and a nation erupts into tears of joy and hap­pi­ness as the ball crosses the line, take a moment to think of those dis­ad­vant­aged South Afric­ans who com­mit crime just to make ends meet; think of the girl whose rap­ist has escaped pun­ish­ment because of the tired and broken justice sys­tem; think of those people’s tears. Real tears.

And when the cap­tain of the win­ning team lifts the trophy and the whole of Hol­land or the entire pop­u­la­tion of Spain explodes with joy, take a minute to think of the losers. No, not the runners-up on a state of the art foot­ball field in Johan­nes­burg; the real losers — the South African people.

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