Looking to 2010

by Editor · June 10, 2009

The kick-off whistle as South Africa�s football team take on Iraq in the opening game of the Confederation Cup on June 14 will signal the final year of preparations for the 2010 World Cup, the second biggest sporting event in the world.

Urban South Africans will be familiar with, and often inconvenienced by, the present upgrading of road, transport and airtravel infrastructure� as the country gets ready to welcome the world.

For South Africa, the World Cup will be an opportunity to prove to the world, and perhaps more so to the sceptics who have emigrated to supposedly greener pastures, that the country can measure itself with the leaders among great nations. It is an opportunity to show that South Africa has to offer more than the tragic news cycle of crime, HIV/Aids, xenophobia and sexual violence.

Perhaps more importantly, it is a time when South Africans, always oscillating between hubris and self-doubt, can affirm themselves as a nation.

The World Cup will present challenges also to the Church. It is encouraging that a task team has begun work on developing a plan to provide pastoral care to the many fans (and, presumably also players) of Catholic faith. Even though the World Cup qualification process is yet to conclude � which means that we will not know until October the precise line-up of teams travelling to South Africa � many participating teams will come from traditionally Catholic countries. It seems certain that these will include such countries as Spain, Italy, France, Brazil and Argentina.

Once the local bishops have issued their pastoral care programme, it will be necessary for the relevant dioceses and parishes to execute it with unconditional commitment. For parishes especially, this may prove to be a stimulating time when local churches can tangibly feel part of the universal Church while hosting fellow Catholics from all over the world. If properly prepared, the World Cup will leave parishes and the Church with many happy memories.

Some host cities, however, will likely endure a hang-over as they will be stuck with municipally-owned state-of the-art stadia for which there will be little sustainable use. Sporting backwaters such as Nelspruit, Polokwane and Port Elizabeth have little hope of ever regularly filling these arenas, but will face spending inordinate amounts of ratepayers� money to maintain them. Even Cape Town�s impressive stadium could become a white elephant unless the Western Province/Stormers rugby set-up moves from the smaller Newlands Stadium to Green Point. After co-hosting the World Cup in 2002, South Korea demolished some of the stadia built specifically for the event. To do likewise in South Africa would be unacceptable.

Some South Africans may consider the World Cup a time for cashing in. Many informal traders will be disappointed at the doubtless strict enforcement of licensing rules. Establishments such as restaurants and bars that are considering increasing their prices to exorbitant levels beyond the reach of locals may well regret following a short-sighted strategy. Such establishments certainly will not merit the loyalty of local patrons after the World Cup. The opportunity to earn money must not be marred by exaggerated expectations or greed.

South Africa will surely benefit greatly from hosting the World Cup, materially and psychologically, but much vigilance must be applied that the economic dividends will be applied in ways that do not exclude the poor.