AFRICANEWS

South Africa

Africa's hopes to host World Cup dashed

Sports

Africa is the only continent yet to host the World Cup. The July 6 announcement that Africa has lost the chance to host the event come 2006 was not pleasant news to South Africans and Africans at large.

The South Africans have never been united in one action than in their hate for Charles Dempsey, the New Zealand representative who chose to abstain from voting than let SA win the 2006 World Cup soccer bid. That is automatically defying also the mandate of his own federation executive, the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC), that he should vote for SA once England was eliminated.

South Africans of all races, social status and creed reserved the strongest terms to condemn Dempsey. Business School students launched a game on their website, where by a click of a computer mouse, you can kick a soccer ball into Dempsey balls (testicles). Across the country, daily newspapers ran headlines that portrayed the hate and anger against Dempsey. A white columnist in the widely black City Press weekly called for a unity "put our destiny in our own hands. If South Africans can bury their past and work together we could build a highly successful country. No-one else cares for us - let us then help each other", the columnist.

While politicians were diplomatic about it with President Thabo Mbeki and Nelson Mandela congratulating Germany for winning shortly after the announcement, the president did not hide his disappointment, he called the event a "tragedy day for Africa". The minister of Tourism and Environment Affairs, Villa Moosa said he "wondered whether Mr Dempsey would ever look at an African straight in the eyes for the rest of his life." Mbeki, who reportedly phoned his New Zealand counterpart, a day after the announcement appealed to South Africans and Africans at large not to take their anger on News Zealanders but Charles Dempsey. "It is Mr Dempsey's thing".

Irvin Khoza, the president of South Africa Football Association (SAFA) said Mr. Dempsey had a lot to explain, firstly to his own federation and to the world why he defied directives from his own country and soccer federation. The South Africans waited a weekend long before the July 10 press conference in New Zealand, at which Dempsey was to explain the reason for his action. At a press briefing, the man who South Africans love to hate and labeled a betrayer appeared on television showing no remorse. Instead he insisted he did the right thing by abstaining from voting because by doing so he did not antagonize any body, claiming he made friends with everyone within the international soccer fraternity.

Dempsey's vote was crucial, for if he voted according to the mandate given by his own country, the final count of vote could have been 12-12 between Germany and South Africa, with Sepp Blatter, Fifa president casting a deciding vote, which could have gone in favour of SA since he has advocated for Africa's turn.

FIFA's awarding of Europe to the World Cup for the 10th time has triggered debate on institutionalised international racism. The World Cup never came to Africa in 100 years, yet the Asia and European representatives in Fifa felt right to award this opportunity to Europe, not Africa.

SA's bid was not a charity seeking mission. Technically the country has all that it takes to host the event. In fact Fifa's own technical assessment of SA stated that South Africa exceeded some of Fifa's requirements.

So where did Africans go wrong in their bid to host the world's most prestigious sporting event? A number of reasons have been attributed to this ranging from the composition of FIFA executive itself to racism.

Those who argue that the composition of FIFA was debilitating factor state that Europe has eight representatives in Fifa, therefore can only seek the cooperation of one of the four continents to endorse its position. In this case seeking Asia's cooperation was important to bulldoze the interest of Africans, North and South Americans and awarded a right to host World Cup 2006 to Germany.

A feature writer in South Africas widely read daily, Sowetan in his reflection of the failed bid quoted the African-American scholar, Walter Mosley who wrote; "as far back as we can go there was a white face that we looked to for the sources of pain; the white man enslaved, the white man freed, the white man opened the school door, the white man tested me and found me lacking".

His argument is that Dempsey was merely a decoy scheduled to be dispensed with-used to deflect the blame from New Zealand, OFC and the rest of the world. The failure could be attributed to international racism and subordination of Africans interest to that of Europeans economic interest.

However, whatever angle one may view the failed African bid from, the fact remains that Africa has failed, not on merit, to be counted among the community of nations as a capable competitor but something else. Why?

Perhaps it's all because soccer is about economics, and a principle of fair play principle which FIFA claim to adhere to and promote around the world did not apply. The economics is about opportunities, and Europeans in cohort with Asians found it fit to afford themselves another opportunity to host the World Cup.

The entire delegation of Confederation of Southern African Football Association (Cosafa) who gathered at the Fifa headquarters, in Switzerland this July were seen on television wearing gloomy faces after the announcement. That is understandable so, given the loss incurred by the sub-region in projected income, if the 2006 World Cup was awarded to Africa.

Leo Mugabe, chairman of Zimbabwean Football Association (ZFA), reportedly stated that Brazil had promised ZFA millions of rands worth projects to set up training camps ahead of the competition. Understandably similar offers were to be negotiated by other countries, Mozambique and Malawi. SA alone had estimated to gain 16.4 billion Rand capital injection into the economy, with creation of hundreds and thousands jobs in the construction and tourism industry.

These hopes have now all gone up in smoke. Charles Dempsey, by defying the mandate of his own federation pulled the plug on Africa's life line and Africa's hopes and interests in international sport dashed.

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