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44% of South Africans Think the Country "Won't be Ready" for 2010
Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 09:07 AM by Bill Archer
Maybe it's a measure of their current insecurity, but regular polling of South African citizens on the subject of the World Cup SHOWS A STEADILY DECLINING LEVEL OF CONFIDENCE that they will be able to pull it off.
To be sure, this pessimism may be at least partly due to the economic conditions currently affecting the entire planet: soaring oil and food prices make everyone uneasy.
In the West, however, changing conditions like these cause belt tightening and reassessment but in the end we know that the hits will be more or less accommodated. In poorer, less developed nations whose economic health is precarious to begin with they can be the harbingers of economic disaster, and it's not surprising if their overall level of optimism about the future in general is plummeting.
But there are more concrete concerns as well; from the beginning, FIFA has said that SA's hosting of next year's Confederations Cup would serve as a sort of dry run for the WC, proving their level of readiness.
In the planning stages, they included only one of the new stadiums, Port Elizabeth/Nelson Mandela Bay, but they stressed at the time how important it was that it be part of the tournament, to show that SA was making concrete progress.
Well, FIFA has now DROPPED PORT ELIZABETH FROM THE SCHEDULE concluding that it simply won't be ready. Local organizers disagree, but nobody else thinks FIFA acted on a whim.
And a new concern is cropping up, one that nobody saw coming: HIGH END RESTAURANTS AND SHOPS IN PORT ELIZABETH/NELSON MANDELA BAY are being forced to close due to the skyrocketing costs of operations.
It seems highly unlikely that the government can afford - monetarily or politically - to heavily subsidize restaurants and stores so that football tourists will have places to eat, but if these places are forced to close, exactly what is the alternative?
And for the record, while PLANS TO LEGALIZE PROSTITUTION for the duration of the tournament may serve as an enticement to many, the customers may end up having to ask the hookers to skip the sex and cook them dinner.
Still, SA is bravely pushing forward. In an effort to quell security concerns they're conducting a high profile SECURITY EXERCISE in Port Elizabeth later this month. It's unlikely to comfort much of anyone.
For irony fans, the RECENT PASSING OF CHARLES DEMPSEY comes with exquisite timing. He's the FIFA board member from New Zealand who abstained from voting in 1999, thus sending the 2006 World Cup to Germany when it appeared that Sepp Blatter had South Africa in the bag.
SA would have had a much easier time pulling this off in 2006, and the question of just what Charlie hath wrought remains unanswered.
.
To be sure, this pessimism may be at least partly due to the economic conditions currently affecting the entire planet: soaring oil and food prices make everyone uneasy.
In the West, however, changing conditions like these cause belt tightening and reassessment but in the end we know that the hits will be more or less accommodated. In poorer, less developed nations whose economic health is precarious to begin with they can be the harbingers of economic disaster, and it's not surprising if their overall level of optimism about the future in general is plummeting.
But there are more concrete concerns as well; from the beginning, FIFA has said that SA's hosting of next year's Confederations Cup would serve as a sort of dry run for the WC, proving their level of readiness.
In the planning stages, they included only one of the new stadiums, Port Elizabeth/Nelson Mandela Bay, but they stressed at the time how important it was that it be part of the tournament, to show that SA was making concrete progress.
Well, FIFA has now DROPPED PORT ELIZABETH FROM THE SCHEDULE concluding that it simply won't be ready. Local organizers disagree, but nobody else thinks FIFA acted on a whim.
And a new concern is cropping up, one that nobody saw coming: HIGH END RESTAURANTS AND SHOPS IN PORT ELIZABETH/NELSON MANDELA BAY are being forced to close due to the skyrocketing costs of operations.
It seems highly unlikely that the government can afford - monetarily or politically - to heavily subsidize restaurants and stores so that football tourists will have places to eat, but if these places are forced to close, exactly what is the alternative?
And for the record, while PLANS TO LEGALIZE PROSTITUTION for the duration of the tournament may serve as an enticement to many, the customers may end up having to ask the hookers to skip the sex and cook them dinner.
Still, SA is bravely pushing forward. In an effort to quell security concerns they're conducting a high profile SECURITY EXERCISE in Port Elizabeth later this month. It's unlikely to comfort much of anyone.
For irony fans, the RECENT PASSING OF CHARLES DEMPSEY comes with exquisite timing. He's the FIFA board member from New Zealand who abstained from voting in 1999, thus sending the 2006 World Cup to Germany when it appeared that Sepp Blatter had South Africa in the bag.
SA would have had a much easier time pulling this off in 2006, and the question of just what Charlie hath wrought remains unanswered.
.
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Blatter really needs to pull the plug while he can. A US tournament would be a huge success, and even more attractive to foreign tourists due to the relative weakness of the dollar.Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 10:02 AM by Claymore 
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i can't imagine restaurants being a problem.
it is still 2 years before the world cup and there will be more than enough entrepreneurs who will be willing to step up come time for the WC.
scary news about legalizing prostitution when considering the level of aids in the country. though i do remember a similar discussion during the WC in germany and there wasn't much of a boom in the sex industry. and i can't imagine too many travelers getting excited to have sex with a prostitute in SA... at least i hope not.Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 10:38 AM by Sweetness
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Problem is, Bill, that stories about how the host country won't be ready precede many World Cup and Olympics. Remember a few years ago, when everyone was terrified that Athens wouldn't complete its subways and stadia in time? They managed. Same will happen here.
This old story always ends in the same manner.Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 11:01 AM by bojendyk
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Bojendyk:
How, exactly, can you compare what happened in Greece, a not exactly poor European country, to what's going on in South Africa, a clearly poor and disaster filled African country?Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 11:19 AM by pr0ner
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Prostitution in an AIDS-ravaged country? You might as well play Russian roulette.
proner, Greece isn't exactly rich, either, and the small population is now bearing the burden of massive debt due to the Games. They've said they'll never bid again -- because they won't be able to afford it. At least they have a metro now.Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 11:39 AM by Reignking
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Montreal just got done paying off the debt from the 1976 Olympic games about 20 MONTHS AGO
THAT one was a fiasco.
But as I pointed out a couple weeks ago, when a country like South Korea builds a bunch of expensive stadiums that they can't use, it's not a big deal. They can afford it.
The comparison with South Africa couldn't be more stark: 40% unemployment, rampant want and hunger and disease and unthinkable poverty and they're spending billions of Rand erecting stadiums in order to get some Westerners to come visit for a month.
And Bo:
You are absolutely correct, but this is different;
Every four years they run around like mad because the velodrome or the yacht basin had delays and they're not sure they can conduct the events.
This year in fact there's an issue with the Beijing rowing venue - something about algae or moss or some such.
But the concerns about SA aren't just confined to construction delays; the country has a huge shortfall in electrical generating capacity, for example, and it's not a question of whether a power plant gets completed in time since they aren't building one.
Ditto the communications center in Port Elizabeth or the transportation infrastructure or a hundred other things that, while they don't involve fat European asses sitting in seats you can't run a WC without them.
And is someone going to solve SA's crime problem in the next two years? The AIDs epidemic? Poverty? The looming disaster in Zimbabwe?
If it was just the buildings, well, it would be a good topic for discussion but not much else.
It's not, unfortunately.
Look, I think it would be a terrible disaster of the first magnitude for the WC to have to end up someplace else. The anger and resentment from all across the continent would be frightening and, in any case, Africa deserves a WC - it really IS their turn, and it's been promised to them.
Fair is fair.
I'm rooting for them as hard as I can, but I don't have an answer to their crime problems ether.Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 11:51 AM by Bill Archer
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Greece has 11.2 million people and a GDP of approximately 342 billion. South Africa has 48 million and a GDP of about $468 billion. Ignorant people tend to believe that everyone in Africa lives in a grass shack but I found South Africa to be a developed country with some real problems. Most people seemed to have a pretty optomistic attitude about their future. With Nelson Mandela's help, the country dodged a bullet and didn't become Zimbabawe. I'm pulling for them and expect South Africa to host the World Cup.
Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 11:52 AM by denver_mugwamp
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So the per capita income in Greece is roughly $30,000 a year. and the per capita income in SA is $9,750 a year. Greece is roughly 3x as wealthy a society as SA. That doesn't really prove your point.
Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 12:25 PM by csc715
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but the standards of living are different. in african you can a make living with $10,000. can you do the same in greece or USA, where i doubt few people even have that money in their accounts from saving after you have been taxed to death
Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 12:33 PM by zizouForlife
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These stats are misleading because there is no such thing as the "average" South African who "makes living with $10,000." Significant numbers of people earn a lot more than that. And an even larger number earn a lot less than that.
In Greece as well as most Western countries there is much less of a gap between rich and poor.Posted 16 Jul 2008 at 12:47 PM by ToMhIlL
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