Only One Ronaldo at SA2010

The Original Ronaldo -- perhaps he should be known as Ronaldo the First -- is acknowledging the inevitable.

That he will not be on Brazil's World Cup team because he is not playing well enough. Or, actually, not playing much at all, for Brazil club team Corinthians.

We will miss the gap-toothed forward, the greatest player in the world there for about six years straddling the millennium.

Remember, Ronaldo is the all-time leading World Cup goalscorer, with 15, scoring in 1998, 2002 and 2006. Gerd Muller of Germany is second, with 14.

It would be nice to have Ronaldo around, for old-time's sake. But if Brazil doesn't have a place on its team for Ronaldinho (and it apparently does not), who has been playing far better ... it certainly doesn't have a spot for our pudgy hero, 33 with a waist line going on 43.

(Oh, and just for a fun, here is a photo from the 2002 World Cup, when Ronaldo wore perhaps the worst haircut in Fifa history.)

Brazil coach Dunga doesn't strike anyone as the sentimental sort, and in his laser-focus drive to bring the Jules Rimet trophy back to Brazil, he is not going to carry out-of-form and out-of-shape forwards.

Maybe it will save this Ronaldo from some embarrassment. In South Africa, whenever people talk about "Ronaldo" ... they almost certainly would be talking about Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo.

Ronaldo the First doesn't need that. Read more!

Threats, and Threats of Terror; Maybe

It just keeps getting better for the 2010 World Cup.

The latest: A poster on a shadowy Islamic fundamentalist blog with, apparently, ties to Al Qaeda, had someone musing about how it would be nice if a bomb went off during the USA-England match on June 12.

And then a London newspaper (no, not one of the dignified ones), had a screaming headline about how "World Cup fans face bloodbath; race war declared in South Africa" ... with the news peg (not that a London tabloid really needs one) apparently being the original threat from political associates of slain white supremacist Eugene Terre Blanche vowing revenge.

The group has since withdrawn that threat. But bad news continues to bludgeon South Africa 2010 as the days begin to dwindle before Day 1.

So, yes, South African organizers said they are on the case. No worries.

More detail:

Here is more on the "bombing threat."

An Algerian wing of [Al Qaeda] has claimed it will carry out attacks on England's Group C match against the United States on June 12 in Rustenberg, prompting new security fears less than two months before the start of the competition.

But football's world governing body FIFA has stressed that such threats can occur in any country and that tournament organizers are fully prepared.

"It does not mean that because we receive a threat the World Cup should not be allowed to be contested in South Africa or any other country,'' Fifa secretary general Jerome Valcke said.

"We have freedom in the world to celebrate what we want. As the management of the organization that governs world football, we know there is a threat. We will not stop the organization of the World Cup because we got the threat."

Not to downplay the threat, but it does occur to us that England and the U.S. are in the same group as Algeria, and perhaps we have a soccer-fan terrorist here who is thinking of hurting players as much as killing civilians. Isn't that the sort of thing you do when you're a murderous soccer fan?

And then there is the English newspaper stuff.

The Daily Star is not a reputable newspaper, but it probably accurately reflects the thinking of some English fans when it suggests:

Security experts fear England fans will be caught in the middle during June’s tournament if the growing army launches a race war. White leaders have vowed “revenge” for the 69-year-old’s killing. They have urged football teams and foreign supporters to avoid the “land of murder”.

World Cup officials are now drawing up emergency plans in case race riots disrupt the whole country.

The AWB plans a show of strength on May 1 near World Cup final city Johannesburg.

Secretary general Andre Visagie said: “We have received hundreds of calls in the last two days. On May 1 we will discuss the appointment of a new leader, and decide how to avenge what has happened.”

More than 25,000 England fans are due to watch Wayne Rooney, 24, and Fabio Capello, 63, launch their World Cup campaign in 10 weeks’ time.

Many supporters have already hired extra security in the crime-ravaged country.

They are even being offered traceable panic buttons to use for emergency rescue if they get caught up in clashes.

So, just another day on the SA2010 beat. Read more!

All Malema All the Time

Eugene Terre Blanche aside, and he is dead, the most divisive and abrasive figure in South Africa today is Julius Malema, president of the African National Council Youth League.

Yes, we will get back to soccer someday, soon, but when JM is ranting, and the ANC is attempting to get its loose cannon under control ... well, it makes for some great theater. If it didn't seem creepy and pre-violent at the same time.

Today, we will look at Malema's outburst during a press briefing in Johannesburg on Thursday, when he called a BBC reporter a "bastard" and a "bloody agent" ... as well as the ANC trying today to muzzle its own youth fuhrer before he creates even more trouble.

If you didn't follow the "Malema outburst" link, here is the best of it ... directed at a young reporter for the BBC, Jonah Fisher:

What irked Malema was Fisher's comment that Malema should not criticise Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's opponents for operating from "air-conditioned offices" in Sandton because the youth league leader himself lives in the area.

"Let me tell you before you are tjatjarag [excited]," a fuming Malema said while wagging his finger at the BBC reporter.

"This is a building of a revolutionary party and you know nothing about the revolution. So here you behave or else you jump."

Amazed by Malema's response, Fisher laughed.

"Don't laugh," warned Malema. "Chief, can you get security to remove this thingy?

"If you are not going to behave, we are going to get security to take you out.

"This is not a newsroom, this. This is a revolutionary house and you don't come here with that white tendency, not here. You can do it somewhere else, not here.

"If you have got a tendency of undermining blacks, even where you work, you are in the wrong place. Here you are in the wrong place."

An angry Fisher retorted: "But that's rubbish."

Malema responded: "You can go out. Rubbish is what you have covered in that trouser - that is the rubbish. You are a small boy, you can't do anything. Go out. Bastard! Go out! You bloody agent!"

As Fisher walked out, Malema turned his fury on the rest of the reporters in the room.

"It's not a beer hall here. It's not a drunk beer hall, cheap beer hall, this. And you ask anybody, including political parties, which tried to undermine this house, what happened to them.

"You can undermine all of us, but not the house. Never undermine the house. When you are here, you are in a different terrain. You are in our space and you are going to behave in a manner that is befitting of being in the ANC office.

"You don't howl here, especially when we speak, and you behave like you are in an American press conference? This is not America, it's Africa," he shouted.


And then, today, Malema was smacked down by the adults in the ANC, who apparently have a better sense of the damage the guy is doing to the party and to the country with the 2010 World Cup nine weeks away.

In the Cliffs Notes version of that, the ANC said ...

“The aggressive and insultive behaviour to the said journalist that culminated with Mr Fisher walking out of the Youth League press briefing cannot be condoned at all,” the organization said in a statement.

It said the “unfortunate outburst” by Malema did not only reflect negatively on him, but also reflected negatively on the ANCYL, the entire ANC family, their Alliance partners as well as South Africa in the eyes of the international community.

Well, that sums things up quite nicely.

If you read to the bottom of the link, we see that Malema was creating problems bigger than bad relations with the media.

He was sending out signs on relations with Zimbabwe that run directly counter to official ANC policy. Malema is backing the policies of president-for-life Robert Mugabe, the man who destroyed the Zimbabwean economy and made his country into one of the more repressive regimes in Africa. Which is saying something. Malema has been saying Zimbabwe sets an example South Africa should follow.

The ANC's official policy toward Zimbabwe is non-intervention in its internal affairs.

Now ... we shall see if the ANC's sensible folks can keep Julius Malema from making news for, oh, about three months. It certainly would improve the chances of the country pulling off a peaceful and successful World Cup. Read more!

A Plea for Racial Harmony in SA

We will make this very simple today.

A gentleman by the name of Jonathan Jansen has written an opinion piece for the Johannesburg Times in which he calls for, hopes for racial harmony. I recommend it.

Jansen is hopeful but not blindly optimistic. Noting, as he does, the failure of leadership in South Africa.

It is interesting in that he concedes that South Africa has "unresolved racial troubles" and that the murder of white supremacist Eugene Terre Blanche is the sort of incident that "forces South Africa to stare (at the issue) in the face."

This seems to be a reasonable, even-handed look at the issues that are roiling the host nation of the 2010 World Cup.

But, again, perhaps reinforcing South African pre-occupation with its troubles ... the World Cup, only the biggest global event in the sports world, is not mentioned once here.

Maybe the answer is simple: Even the World Cup doesn't seem important when your country isn't all that far from a race-based cataclysm.
Read more!

Tensions Escalate Anew in South Africa

Maybe this series of events, the "kill the Boer" song, the Boers who were, in fact, killed, the murder of white supremacist Eugene Terre Blanche ... maybe this just isn't going to go away anytime soon.

The Johannesburg Times has several stories about the current tensions.

One of them, here, is what we in journalism call a think piece ... about how the murder of Terre Blanche could reinvigorate the previously fading far right wing of the white political spectrum.

It is interesting and thorough, but a bit of a heavy read. Perhaps this sums it up:

"It is possible that the killing of Terre Blanche will greatly strengthen the hand of a new hardened right wing in South Africa. In life, Terre Blanche attracted a small, uninfluential, and extremist following. He will not be mourned for what he stood for. However, in death he may come to represent the experiences of scores of minority groups in the country who perceive themselves as being on the receiving end of racist and now also violent abuse from the ANC. In effect, therefore, Terre Blanche may be seen as having been martyred for a minority cause in the country."

There is more. Much more. Including audio from an angry scene outside a courthouse, with whites led by the AWB party on one side, and blacks on the other ... and a story that Terre Blanche's body was stripped ...

Again, we're back to thinking this is not a country that ought to be the scene of an international sports event in nine weeks.

This story, about how the body of Terre Blanche was stripped, is mostly tawdry and objectionable ... but some interesting atmosphere is described at the bottom, which we will copy here:

Racial tensions were high outside the court.

At least 50 police officers and a police helicopter monitored the scene. On several occasions the situation threatened to turn violent but did not.

The police kept AWB members and farmers, and the local black community, at a safe distance from each other.

The AWB supporters sang the old national anthem, Die Stem, and the black crowd sang Nkosi Sikelela iAfrika.

Four apartheid South Africa flags and about 20 Vierkleur flags were held up during the singing. The police intervened when insults, and a bottle of fruit juice, were hurled by a woman in the AWB camp, sparking a face-off between the two groups.

Racial slurs such as "Hulle is k*****s en bobbejaane" were shouted by AWB followers, some wearing T-shirts with the words "100% Boereseun" and "Staan saam of sterf alleen" (Stand together or die alone).

Local resident Keoagile Mookisi said: "These white people are angry. They think the death is political. They are calling us k*****s. Even on farms they call us k*****s. This is how we live."

Tiaan Theron, a farmer who travelled 1300km from Beaufort-West for the trial, said the extremists' sentiments were not shared by everyone. "Vengeance only comes through God," he said.

Here is some audio from a reporter on the scene. Clearly, it was not an ice-cream-social kind of setting.

The African National Congress, which controls the government, apparently has ordered Youth Leader Julius Malema, a massively polarizing figure, to stop singing the "kill the Boer" song. Orders he may or may not obey.

And while we are plowing through an alarming but significant group of stories, consider this one: Where a South African policeman shot to death four whites he said were racially taunting him and were going to attack him.

Other countries around the world -- say, the United States -- have race-based hate. But when it comes to killing, U.S. police consistently maintain that it overwhelming stays within a racial group. Whites kill whites, blacks kill blacks, etc.

And this is just a ridiculous reason for four men to end up dead -- an argument that began over a "joke" about penis size.

What will be interesting to see is if South Africa gets a grip on the situation as the World Cup draws near.

What is fascinating, and perhaps very telling, is how all these stories of anger and hate and suspicion ... seem to live in their own seething universe. No one seems at all interested (angry populace, or media) in taking into account how this looks on the world stage ... how this plays in the living rooms of the rest of the world.

It is as if a big part of South Africa is so focused on its internal hate that it can't even be bothered to consider it has the biggest event in global sports coming to its shores two months hence.

Soccer fans, not to mention Fifa, have to find that alarming. Read more!

Back to the Toy Department

After two days of dealing with weighty issues, we return to issues considered weighty by those involved ... but, ultimately delightfully frivolous. Which is what sports is about, is it not?

It is the latest eruption in the long-running "club vs. country" debate.

Over most of the eight-month history of this blog, club coaches have been going after national coaches for pushing their lads too hard, allowing them to aggravate injuries and putting their World Cup activities at risk. Cristiano Ronaldo comes to mind.

This time, it is the national coach who is irate, and the club coach who is on the defensive.

Specifically, we have Raymond Domenech of France attacking Arsene Wenger, also a Frenchmen, but in this case more importantly the coach of English club team Arsenal.

Wenger played William Gallas, a top French defender most recently notorious with les bleus for scoring the goal after Thierry Henry's infamous handball vs. Ireland. Anyway, Wenger started Gallas in a high-profile Champions League match vs. Barcelona.

Gallas had been struggling with a calf injury, and had been out for weeks. His comeback didn't last until halftime; Gallas reinjured his calf in the match with Barca and now will be out more than a month.

Which has Domenech hopping mad. "I'm livid and pissed off," Domenech told reporters. "It's outrageous and irresponsible to have played him so early after the injury. It's scandalous. He'd better be fit for the World Cup."

Meanwhile, Wenger is not exactly apologizing.

"I don't think it will cost him (Gallas) his World Cup," Wenger said. "I believe he declared himself fit and I have the reports from the rehabilitation center where he worked for 10 days and he had four days training with the team. Maybe we should have taken some more time but he was jumping, running up and down the stairs in France, had very hard sessions. At some stage you are in a job where you have to produce performances."

He added that it was Gallas's decision, too.

Said Wenger: "Gallas was born in 1977 - he's 32 - so you ask a player of that experience, 'do you feel ready to play? Have you worked hard enough? Do you feel ready to go into this game?' When they say yes you have to believe them. We have to first take care of the interests of Arsenal.

"The French national team is important, but Arsenal is, as well, and he is paid by the club, not the French national team. We have to use the players when they declare themselves fit."

Somehow, we doubt that mollified Domenech, who may be without one of his starting XI. And will have to make a decision on him by May 18.

This won't be the last we hear of these problems. Not with club seasons reaching their climax and the World Cup barely nine weeks away. But these are problems we can handle.
Read more!

Well, This Is a Start to Chilling Out

The right-wing party that the day before vowed revenge for the murder of white supremacist Eugene Terre Blanche ... today backed away from the threat of violence.

This is a welcome reduction in rhetoric in a country teetering on the brink of, well, let's call it what it would be ... a race war. Just as the 2010 World Cup is hoving into view.

The move away from the "vengeance" stance also came on the same day as the South African Communist Party condemned the killing of Terre Blanche ... putting the communists squarely in the camp of careful moderation.

Who knew?

Overall, it was a day for chilling out. With some exceptions.

The spokesman for the ABW party, which represents the hard right of Afrikaner politics, said that "In the heat of the moment certain statements were made, and I would like to retract those statements." He maintained it was the party's policy "that no member will engage in any form of violence, intimidation, racial slandering or anything of that (sort). It will not be tolerated." He said, however, it was difficult to keep the party's members "calm."

However, the ABW seems likely to call for a portion of South Africa to be ceded to whites, apparently on the "homeland" basis that the apartheid regime used to fence off ethnic minorities. Interesting concept.

Julius Malema, however, appears to represent a flash point here, with the ABW calling for president Jacob Zuma to muzzle the ANC's Youth League leader.

The spokesman said Zuma's first job should be "closing Julius Malema's mouth," suggesting that he go back to school and join the boy scouts "so that he can learn humility."

Anyway, a day of cooling tensions. Everyone interested in the World Cup, or an orderly world, has to be pleased. Read more!