Wednesday, November 23, 2022 Wheeling University The 2026 Qatar World Cup and the Controversy Around it By Armando Loynaz Prof. Michelle Bennington World Community 1 Index Page Introduction …………………………………………………………………………………………………3 Understanding FIFA…………………………………………………………………………………….4 - 6 Infrastructure and Human Rights Concerns……………….……………………………………….7 - 10 Expectations vs Reality of the World Cup………………………………………………………….11 - 12 Conclusion and Final Thoughts………………………………………………………………………….13 Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………………………. 14 2 Introduction When Qatar won the bid to host the 2026 World Cup, the whole world asked themselves, why Qatar. At the point in time when Qatar won the bid, the country had a very poor soccer culture, little to none infrastructure to host an event of such magnitude and importance like the World Cup and last but not least many cultural differences to the rest of the World that would make this world cup very different. Over the past 10 years there have been many accusations directed to the country of Qatar and its political leaders because of the lack of diversity, countless human rights violations, its alleged abuse of power to win the bid and the serious accusations regarding corruption. In this I paper want to address the different problems Qatar has faced and created for the World Cup and also highlight the innovation and organization Qatar has provided to host an event of such magnitude. As the biggest event in the world every 4 years, there is always good and bad, my goal is to explain and praise the truths and give my opinion around the more controversial and not so true comments and allegations regarding both the World Cup and the decisions made around the World Cup by the leaders of Qatar and FIFA, Mohammed Bin Hammad and Joseph Blatter specifically. 3 Understanding FIFA When it comes to the world of sports, there is really only one sport that is worldwide, and that is football, that is because it is the easiest sport to play, the only thing a kid needs to play soccer is a ball, and it can be a rock and bottle or anything that can be kicked around. Football as we know it was created in England in the late 1800’s and it started to spread around the world in the early years of the 20th century. To fully understand the controversy and criticism around this years World Cup hosted in Qatar, first, we have to understand the beginnings of FIFA as an organization and how as it became a business things started to get a little shady In 1904, the governing body for football was formed in Paris, France and it was established as FIFA (International Federation of Association Football). In the early days of FIFA, its main purpose was to set the rules and regulations of the game, create a more organized structure for football and organize tournaments between, teams, leagues and nations. As a big first tournament of FIFA, the World Cup was started, the most prestigious sports tournament was first played in 1930 in Uruguay, of course with the outbreak of the war, the World Cup had halts and in reality FIFA didn’t have much of a big role in Football until 1974. In 1974 Presidential elections where held by FIFA, and a new president was elected, the Brazilian lawyer and businessman Joao Havelange. From the start of his 24 year term, he was determined to make a change in Football, making it a business which was very good for the sport because of the great amount of money it started to bring in. With the rise of technology and television, the growth of football was exponential making it a multimillion dollar business. 4 Everything seemed nice and pretty for FIFA with Havelange until the 1978 World Cup was hosted in Argentina during a gruesome dictatorial regime under Jorge Videla, yes the tournament was a success, it brought a lot of money in to FIFA because for the first time it had sponsors that paid good money, including Adidas and Coca Cola, and for a whole month it made the people in Argentina forget about the tragedy they where living through. Up until now everything seems correct, a couple of bad decisions that raise some eyebrows but nothing major that sparks real concern. FIFA had a span of around 15 years were sometimes they were target of corruption allegation but nothing serious, up until 1998 where the real trouble starts for FIFA, with the election of Joseph Blatter, a Swiss who had been Secretary General of FIFA for the past 16 years and previously had served as a development officer for FIFA in Ethiopia. In 1998 Joseph Blatter is elected president of FIFA and soon enough his real colors started to show. Just over two years after being in office, scandals started to come afloat, not involving him directly but his colleagues. In 2001 a partner company of FIFA goes into bankrupt and many accusations are directed towards FIFA officials because supposedly they were taking checks from that company, of course, all of this is denied by the president, Mr Blatter. In another accusation, prior to the 2002 elections, Secretary General Michel Zen-Ruffinen, accuses Mr. Blatter and his colleagues of mismanagement, corruption and abuse of power. All of these allegations lead to nothing and Mr. Blatter wins the elections with no problem. In 2008 he wins the elections again, unopposed, that for many seemed like the whole institution of FIFA was corrupt. In 2010 is when everything explodes, with the bidding of the 2018 and the 2022 world cup happening that year, all eyes where on that bidding. When it was announced that the 5 mentioned World Cups were won by Russia and Qatar respectively the world was shocked, and even more so when the opposing bids were the United States and England. For the whole world it was a shock, and now real allegations started to pop up inciting that FIFA and its officials begging by its president Mr. Blatter were all involved in some sort of shady business with representatives of both Russia and Qatar, this allegations were never proved to be true but left the world wondering. To make it even worse, Mr. Blatter would come out in press conferences and talk about how gay people should behave if going to the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, “refrain from any sexual activities”, were his words. Not only talking about gay people he mentions women’s football and has a very particular eye on it, “women’s soccer would be more popular if only the players would wear tighter shorts.” Shortly after everything that happened in 2010 around FIFA and its president, the FBI opened an investigation. The investigation led to the collapse of Mr. Blatter’s FIFA reign, and in 2015 more than a dozen FIFA officials were arrested on charges of corruption and bribery, and Mr. Blatter was forced to resign. In 2015, the 17 years mandate by the corrupt and fraudulent Joseph Blatter comes to an end, leaving FIFA in possibly its worst image, position and shape of its history. 6 Infrastructure and behavior in Qatar For the first time in over 90 years of World Cup history, it will be hosted by an Arab country and this is great for the sport, the fact that the World Cup has been played in every continent but Oceania says a lot. Arab countries are very young, and many became independent long after the first World Cup was played, so bringing the event to one of the countries is something I consider to be super important for the growth of the sport in that region but are the Arab nations, culturally ready to be hosts of the biggest and most diverse sporting event in the world? In my opinion football is the World’s sport and everyone no matter what race, religion or gender you are should be able to enjoy the beautiful things the sport brings such as having the possibility of hosting a world cup. Hosting a World Cup implies a lot of things, the country hosting it has to have the right infrastructure and right political, economical and social situation for the safety of both the players and the fans. In many sectors of the economy the country should be able to handle the amount of fans coming into the country, that for this year’s world cup the estimated amount of people traveling to the country is 1.2 million people, this is a huge responsibility. The fact that so many people travel to the World Cup means that the country has to have the capability to provide sleeping arrangements, food supplies, appropriate transportation methods and an impeccable security situation for everyone attending the event. In many ways Qatar has been challenged to prove that they are worthy of hosting the World Cup, the first point I want to touch on is sleeping arrangement. As I mentioned before, over a million people will travel to watch World Cup games and Qatar has made its best possible efforts to try and provide accommodation for everyone. Over 120 hotel were built in anticipation 7 for the World Cup ranging from 5 star luxury hotels with a price of over $2,000 per night, to luxury cruise ships that go for over $1,000 per night, regular hotels with your basic commodities starting at around $200 per night and the newest form of accommodation, fan villages with cruise-ship style rooms that hold up to 60,000 fans, in this fan villages you have everything you’ll need including a bathroom, shower, beds, mini fridge and coffee machine, this rooms are listed as suitable for 2 persons. Each fan village has a main area that has different restaurants for every price range, shopping stores, medical centers and a villages dedicated to the fans with screens to watch the games, different actives throughout the day to entertain guests. This villages are built both in Doha, Qatar and surprisingly also in Dubai, about 400 miles away from Doha. The amount of money invested by these two countries is out of this world, it is calculated that just in hotels, the fan villages and roads, bridges, tunnels, subways and subway stations more than 200 billion dollars, just another showing of the amount of money and power the country of Qatar has. All this great accomplishments come with their faults. The fact that so many things were built in so little time means a lot of work had to be done by a lot of people, and in this case most of the work force was conformed by underpaid migrant workers. Most allegations around this topic are true, yes, the government of Qatar hired migrant workers to do most of the work during the construction of stadiums, hotels, roads and anything else that was being built for the World Cup. The sad reality of the migrant worker situation is that because of the working conditions that were imposed by the Qatari government to be ready for the World Cup in time they were exploited and adding to the fact that the weather in Qatar is very hot with the average temperature being 113 F in summer. All this conditions set by either the government to fulfill 8 schedule or the climate and weather took a really big toll on the workers and their lives. From 2010 since it was announced that Qatar would host the World Cup up until summer of 2022 there were over 6,500 deaths of migrant workers, which just left the whole world astonished and in disbelief. Many human rights advocates protested and tried to make it news to the world about the situation but the Qatari government did well to mask the situation helped with the fact that covid hit and was used as an excuse of all this deaths. . A very important part of hospitality is the capability of the home country making the guests feel welcome, not only with good hotels and good entertainment but really making people feel welcomed. This has been probably the biggest concern surrounding this year’s World Cup, the cultural differences Qatar and most Arab countries have with the rest of the World are a big concern for fans, not in a bad way but just because of the fact that the culture clash can be conflicting in some situations. There is great concern amongst fans on how they should behave when in public in Qatar because of the strict laws against public affection, the way of dressing, the alcohol prohibition and many more things that to the western world may be normal but in Qatar aren’t and as a guest in the country, the fans should respect that whether you are in favor or against all this strict rules. The Qatari government has really strict rules on sexual preferences and public behavior. Which are the main concern for the fans attending. Previous experience from tourists tells us that the rules and laws set in Qatar, should be followed. There are certain behaviors and attitudes that are more frowned upon than others and the country of Qatar is very interested in keeping things how they like, and stated in their official tourism ministry web page., “As in all Middle Eastern countries, showing overt affection and intimacy in public is frowned upon.” Not only this but 9 also, “Attitudes towards dress in Qatar are relaxed, but visitors (men as well as women) are expected to show respect for local culture by avoiding excessively revealing clothing in public. It is generally recommended for men and women to ensure their shoulders and knees are covered.” And last but not least,”Qatari ladies will not shake hands with men, and many men will not shake a lady’s hand as a gesture of respect.” All of these things are very normal in the Western world but as a guest in Qatar during the World Cup, this strict rules have to be followed not only to avoid trouble but also to respect the tradition and culture of the Qatari people. Most national teams had some response to all the human right violations and the lack of freedom of speech in Qatar, while most just came out with statements some took it a little extra to raise even more awareness. Both of Denmarks uniforms are designed as a form of protest, England, Spain and the Netherlands invited in a couple of occasions migrant workers to their training sessions to be apart of them and talked about their experience. The biggest sign of protest in my opinion came from 10 different European countries, they all agreed to wear a rainbow armband in support of the LGBT community but this was prohibited by FIFA. In reality no team or country is happy about the limitations and controversial decisions FIFA has imposed to preserve the conservative culture Qatar has but unfortunately when you get invited to a place you don’t get there and impose your rules and culture, so the World has to follow what Qatar wants you to follow. 10 Expectations vs Reality of the World Cup The World Cup is now well underway, the group stage is finished and now just the knockout stages are left. For over 12 years the world patiently waited to see how the 2022 Qatar World Cup would go with all the concerns surrounding it. Not only for the fans was the anticipation super stressful, both for the FIFA and the country of Qatar the need for everything to run smooth was key. In my opinion, and from the different media outlets that I have used to do my research, everyone seems to think the same, the tournament has had impeccable organization with little to no hiccups. From an incredible organization in customs offices, to perfect accommodation, to a beautiful and perfect World Cup atmosphere. Starting from airport and land immigration office, according to many fans there were no problems going through customs, on the other side many fans got stuck In customs, especially when traveling by car due to customs officers not being too polite and having too many questions, supposedly another great problem was the language barrier between many fans, especially South American fans traveling from Ecuador and Argentina. The most important investment Qatar made for this World Cup, in terms of money, was the construction of hotels and buildings for fans to stay in, which of course was the main concern for the fans. I have information from a direct source that went to the world cup and stayed at one of the Fan Villages, he explains that on one hand the effort made by Qatar was gigantic and that the organization of the thousands of rooms, stores, dining halls and everything else involved was impeccable, everything was perfect. He did have some serious criticism towards the temperatures in Qatar accompanied by the fact that the Air Conditioning in many rooms didn’t work properly. 11 Other than some minor problems Qatar prepared themselves to receive the world in a perfect way. To many the biggest concern was the atmosphere that would be lived throughout the World Cup, not only at the stadium but also in the streets, in malls, and basically everywhere in the country. Having in mind that soccer in Qatar is very young and there aren’t many teams that have good fans in the country’s league, the atmosphere is probably the best we’ve had since the 2010 World Cup. The streets are packed with fans, the fan zones are always vibrant full of people doing some sort of activity, may it be eating, going to the beach, playing soccer or just watching a game on the big screens. The most important part of a good atmosphere is how fans act and how they cheer they teams while they are playing, this world cup has set big standards for the next, the highest attendance so far was of 88,000 people. It is predicted that the final will be completely sold out which means a total of 89,000 fans will be attending. It is calculated that for the 32 group stage games the amount of fans in stadiums was at an astonishing 94% compared to the stadiums full capacity, which are numbers that really show the reality of the passion from fans that travel from all over the world to watch their teams play. 12 Conclusion and Final Thoughts Hosting a world cup is no simple task and even less for a country that has very little knowledge of soccer. For the past 12 years Qatar was subject of criticism and lots of allegations, that I consider to be true and appropriate, Qatar won the rights to host the World Cup because of money, power and corruption. But Qatar has proved to the rest of the World that an Arab country has the capabilities, the will and the desire to be part of the biggest sports event in history of man kind and not only be part of it, but perform accordingly and set a really high bar for the next hosts because their job to host this World Cup has been impeccable. Everything in the organization side of the tournament was done in the right way, fans enjoyed themselves and keep on doing so, teams had everything they needed and more to be able to compete at the highest of levels. In my honest opinion, the world cup shouldn’t have been played In Qatar, but the decision was made and nothing could have been done about it 12 years ago. The world accepted the fact that Qatar was hosting the World Cup and if you were going to attend the World Cup, you had to play by the rules and laws of Qatar for everything to run smoothly like it has been. In conclusion, the fans, the organization, FIFA, the teams and everyone involved in making sure that this World Cup was up to the expectations really worked hard to make It possible because I just can imagine how someone that actually got the opportunity to attend and live the World Cup as a fan feels, if I have been living my life for the past 2 weeks according to the World Cup games schedule, Qatar should feel proud about their organization but also know that they have a lot to work on as the World moves on from the conservative ideal. 13 Bibliography Pattisson, P., & McIntyre, N. (2022, November 28). Revealed: 6,500 migrant workers have died in Qatar since World Cup awarded. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/ global-development/2021/feb/23/revealed-migrant-worker-deaths-qatar-fifa-worldcup-2022 Rollin, J. (2022, November 16). 2015 FIFA corruption scandal | Explained, Qatar, & 2022 World Cup. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/event/2015-FIFAcorruption-scandal Homewood, B. (2015, October 8). NEWSMAKER-Soccer-Blatter’s ship finally runs aground. U.S. https://www.reuters.com/article/soccer-fifa-blatter-profileidUKL3N1282BZ20151008 Pleasance, C. & Reuters. (2022, November 9). First look inside cramped fan villages at Qatar World Cup. Mail Online. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11407671/Firstlook-inside-cramped-fan-villages-Qatar-World-Cup.html 14