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Africa hopes World Cup will change continent’s image

JOHANNESBURG - It’s billed as “Africa’s World Cup”, and countries across the continent are hitching their stars to the tournament, hoping to change the image of a region often perceived in degrees of crisis.

Hosting the championship for the first time on on African soil, South Africa will show off modern new stadiums as well as highways, trains and airports upgraded for the event.

But other countries are hoping to use the media spotlight to promote investment or simply to show the Africa that exists outside of conflicts and disasters.

“We have said continuously that this is an African World Cup,” South African President Jacob Zuma told parliament last week. “We have an opportunity to promote foreign investment, tourism and trade.”

“This gives us the best opportunity to demonstrate our ability and thereby strengthen our global competitiveness.”

Most of the tangible benefits of hosting the World Cup will accrue to South Africa, which expects 373,000 foreign visitors who will spend 8.8 billion rands (1.1 billion dollars, 915 million euros) during the four weeks of matches.

FIFA has created a 70 million dollar fund to upgrade pitches and provided training for teams around the continent.

But many African nations see the main benefits in terms of the publicity from having an expected 25 billion viewers focus on the continent during the matches, which kick off June 11.

“The World Cup organised in South Africa is an unprecedented chance to show another picture of Africa, not just wars,” Senegalese Football Federation President Augustin Senghor told AFP.

Nigeria, which is competing at the World Cup, plans to open an exhibition on the sidelines of the tournament to promote investment in the oil-rich nation.

“We wish to showcase Nigeria and its enormous potentials via a Nigeria village at the World Cup,” said Sani Lulu, head of the Nigeria Football Federation.

Any publicity gains assume the event runs smoothly, especially without any major incidents of crime, said Casper Jangale, commercial manager of the Football Association of Malawi.

“If things go well, Africa will have a good image. This will be a huge benefit to Africa,” he said, especially in drawing tourists to the region.

“Many other tourists are waiting for the World Cup to end in order to come to Africa. But if security is not there, this will shut the door to tourists to coming to Africa,” he added.

South Africa’s neighbours had banked on a tourism boom from football fans, and had hoped to lure teams to set up base camps inside their borders.

Most of those dreams haven’t panned out.

For Namibia and Botswana, the winter months are already their peak tourism season, so any gains would be marginal.

Zimbabwe says North Korea will train there for two weeks before the tournament, and is hoping for 100,000 tourists, mostly South Africans fleeing the crowds at home.

Few African fans plan to make the trip to watch games in the stadiums. While South Africans were offered steep discounts, with tickets for about 20 dollars, Africans from other countries had to pay at least four times that amount.

About 80,000 Africans from other countries are expected to visit during the World Cup, most of them people from neighbouring nations, often without tickets but hoping to enjoy the festival atmosphere.

Ivory Coast, one of Africa’s best teams, hopes to bring 2,000 supporters to South Africa, said Joseph Boni, of the fan club for the Elephants national side.

“All Africans are very proud of the first World Cup on African soil,” Boni said.

Simply awarding the tournament to South Africa was a vote of confidence in the region, said Senghor.

“On one level, it must be appreciated that the international community recognises that Africa has the right and the capacity to organise such a major economic, sporting and media event,” he said.

“This shows that Africa is on the right path.”