BigWoof31;1713802; said:
I appreciate the facilities review and geographic crash course, but my criticism circulated primarily around the crime in the country during the event.
Are you really comparing the overall safety of the tournament to Germany? Do you really feel confident in comparing the security of S.Africa to a nation that has hosted previous Olympic games?
They flew in 40,000 whores for a month! A MONTH! Assuming that one pimp or "talent manager" is responsible for 10 of them and you're already in trouble.
Sir - it's clear you have strong pride in the country and it's tremendous news about the airport and transportation that have been upgraded (much needed). But national pride isn't going to prevent the waves of armed robberies that are coming in the upcoming month. If the criminals are already stalking foreign journalist in their own hotel rooms, it's horrible news and god help you if radical islam decides to take a road trip down south.
The World Cup is now over. Prior to the WC, Franz Beckenbauer continued to the last few months to protest that South Africa could never be ready for the WC and that Germany or Australia should prepare to host the event. His pathetic attempt to pretend the FIFA committee somehow stopped crime in a WSJ quote belies the humble pie he was forced to eat in an interview on South African TV. In total, all but 8 of more than 132,000 flights arrived in time for games, the 8 planes being delayed due to a glitch in a new computer flight system and FIFA VIP private jets that refused to leave the apron at Durban Airport last week.
South Africa defended itself against criticism about violent crime, disruptive labor strikes and lackluster organization ahead of the 2010 World Cup. Now the country is winning widespread praise after a successful tournament, boosting its ambitions to host other major sporting events....
"The general view is that South Africa has done an excellent job in staging the World Cup. There have been far fewer, if any, issues than were expected," said Michael Payne, former chief marketing officer of the International Olympic Committee. "The fact that they have proved they can do this will be a very good calling card to go after other events." (
Wall Street Journal link)
An SA Tourism board member told me on Saturday that research reports that there were more than 1,000,000 foreign visitors to South Africa during the WC.
Despite that fact that this was the most attended World Cup since the USA, the onslaught of crime that was forecast did not materialize. Three journalists claimed to have been held up, yet magically were not harmed in any way. Two Paraguayan players claimed to have lost to Spain in the quarterfinal because the bus to transport them to their first game broke down and taxis had to be arranged. Huh? Furthermore, the two claimed that things were stolen from the safes in their rooms. Oh wait...
A handful of tourists reported muggings and the World Cup court system, set up to give foreign visitors relief that crimes against them would be heard swiftly, heard only 172 cases--with foreigner on foreigner crime and press/trademark infringements prominent. The security and anti-terrorism people did a magnificent job.
As host of the most-watched sporting event on earth,
South Africa set out to reinvent itself in the eyes of the world, casting off its reputation as a place defined by violent crime, poverty and AIDS. To a remarkable degree, it succeeded. (
New York Times link)
As will be clear from my posts prior to the WC, the virtually crime-free not at all surprised. Life here is nothing like it is said to be in the international post. Yesterday, there was a program on al-Jazeera in which British and American journalists admitted that most of their peers wrote stories on South Africa from a distance, consulting only the stories that each other wrote. Several critical journalists have written glowing stories of the South Africa that they have seen outside of the WC.
When compared to most of the previous World Cup hosts, South African stadiums were better, the infrastructure worked better, security was better, and crime was almost non-existent. I hope that Americans will learn from this and engage with African markets, where markets are fast-growing and American brands still have tremendous cache despite the influx of the Chinese.
