World Cup 2014: what’s going on in Brazil?
Por Simon Tarmo - 01.08.2010
In three years and 10 odd months, the 2014 World Cup Brazil will begin. Quite predictably, the conclusion of the widely acclaimed South Africa 2010 event has already driven a wave of pessimistic Brazil-focused journalism.
And just plain bad behaviour throughout the world’s sport and international affairs commentator ranks, not to mention by every other half literate football blogger who has seen where Rio is on a map. While Brazil’s chequered history certainly provides some easy targets, what is the real situation 46 months out from the next World Cup?
To begin with, a condemnation: journalists and ‘specialists’ in major events making derogatory comments about the politics and development of a 500 year old country with 190 million odd people is simply not on. It is as if any sense normal, considered commentary goes out the door just because Brazil, sport and FIFA is involved.
Furthermore, speaking of FIFA, how the judgement of a sporting body with a bunch of controversies hanging over its own head can be held in such high esteem in relation to massive nation building schemes is beyond me. How about actually ensuring the integrity of the sport you are responsible for rather than making loose, one-dimensional and often arrogant comments about the marginally more important issue of a country´s development, just because you’re holding an event there. It’s alright, people will still watch the Cup even if there are still favelas, crime, poverty, traffic jams and slightly smelly stadium toilets in the country in which it is held. Now let the adults discuss the real issues.
A few days after the 2010 Cup final Brazil’s President Lula made a number of retaliatory remarks to the kind of reports and questioning described above and I say bravo, any president would and should about their homeland, particularly when faced with ridiculous and boorish speculation about their (rapidly developing) nation´s ability to host a major event four years in the future. Lula said, essentially, “do you think we are idiots?.”
And that really is it; who are you, what the hell is going on? What possible qualifications do you have to cast dispersions at a place you maybe travelled to once or twice and saw in a few movies? Phrases like “it´s just incredible” and adjectives like “unbelievable” are straight out of prime time, un-researched, inflammatory, current affairs program nightmares that should have their own cable TV comedy channel. Yes, some Brazilian politicians and commentators have also used such phrases and raised such issues and to report this is valid, but only as valid as, say, a southern senator´s belief on anti-abortion laws or the ranting of a pro or anti climate change crusader. If no alternative view is provided, or available, the reports become problematic. Such shoddy, unbalanced work may be tolerable for neighbourhood bully stories but please not for foreign affairs. It’s kind of important.
Oh, but we´re just doing our job, say the journos and commentators. No. A good deal of the recent reports on Brazil 2014 are not respectable journalism but some flimsy babbling based on either straight out ignorance, laziness and/or political ideology. Reporters have been unashamedly using old news and statements, often from months ago, mixed with translated reports from particular bloggers, politicians and fellow biased editorial journalists in Brazil to justify their unsubstantiated criticisms, as if an up-to-date and researched appraisal is just too hard or maybe beyond them. What tripe. Is it too much to ask for some actual coverage of what is going on in Brazil, here and now, rather than massive generalizations and outdated commentaries followed by silly, weak statements like ‘let´s just hope they are fixing all that bad stuff over there’.
Oh, but you don´t have to read it, you say. Sure, great response. Unfortunately you are an opinion maker and, unfortunately, when it comes to Brazil, there ain´t that much in the way of English-language reporting, so the few bits and pieces that get through are always influential. To give you a tip, Brazil´s media sector is strong, multi-faceted, polemical, and while it has its own problems there is still a wealth of information and analysis out there, certainly enough to be able to check the different angles on any given topic, and maybe even some original material. Hopefully automatic Portuguese translators improve over the coming years, but somehow I don´t see that making a big impact.
Having just mentioned Brazil´s media sector, a few more words are called for. News coverage here is plentiful, with many different media sources and alternatives, however a word of warning must be issued. When it comes to its own standing on the international stage, there is a noticeable tendency towards negativity and self deprecation.
Blame it on years of corrupt, unstable government, or shame stemming from the country´s many ongoing social problems, or simple, political manoeuvring, blame it on what you will, but the fact remains that there is always a wealth of highly critical commentary and opinions on any given issue involving Brazil´s development and how it compares with the rest of the world. A good thing, no doubt, but that is only in an environment of balanced reporting, where alternative views and objective information can be found, as they always can be, even if the negativity tends to win the day more often than not. With this in mind, it is not difficult to see how international media develops a pessimistic tone when it comes to Brazil, even if that does not make it right.
To offer some type of counterbalance, based on a couple of years of living here and researching the 2014 World Cup, the ‘real’ situation in Brazil 46 months out from the event is that, sure, the country is probably a bit late on a few fronts, but ‘bit’ and `few` are the operative words, considering there are a bunch of things to take into account other than just the ‘ideal’ timeline that the gods at FIFA have set and a good portion of the world’s media seems intent upon worshipping. As these such vital preparations for a sporting event unfold, presidential and state government elections, both considered reasonably important, are also approaching, while other little things like national disasters, corruption, sustainable development, favela crime and some other such issues are also to be taken into account. These are Brazil’s problems and realities and it is dealing with them in its own way, while also organising the 2014 World Cup.
Indeed, much of the tardiness currently affecting a number of Cup preparations is directly linked to the very noble cause of overcoming corruption still lingering from days and political systems gone by. Brazilians, due to a factor closely linked to the negativity mentioned above, are now so very intent on transparency and due process that the country´s resultant overly-bureaucratic government takes a quite a while to get things done. In an ironic twist, this sluggishness recently prompted President Lula to controversially preside over a legislation change enabling quicker tender processes and negotiations involving Cup preparations. Naturally, the opposition and national media have reacted with all kinds of warnings about collusion and conspiracy, but why the hell should that be of interest to you, international opinion maker, as long as the 2014 World Cup goes off without a hitch? Who cares if there are a few backhanders along the way, that’s not the big issue is it?
To address some real issues, then, reports claiming that just about every 2014 Cup project in Brazil is behind schedule are not only wrong but incredibly stupid. There are an unprecedented twelve World Cup host cities for Brazil 2014; that’s twelve city councils, twelve state governments and, thankfully, just the one federal government, all working together to get a bunch of things done by an immovable deadline while also representing Brazil´s 190+ million residents. I don’t know about you, but that sounds like a %$&# fight to me, no matter where you are in the world, excepting maybe Monaco or Singapore, or North Korea for different reasons.
Apart from this unavoidably scary organisational structure overseen by a plethora of competing interests, there´s also the matter of five or six key areas of preparatory works incorporating hundreds of projects of various shapes and sizes, most requiring multiple funding sources, construction stages and regulatory approvals. (I know, why don´t they just build the damn things and be done with it…).
So, amongst all this really complicated stuff and more Brazil has reached the 46 months to go mark and, apparently, everything is behind schedule. All of it. Not only would I like to meet the person who researched each one of these projects and determined the ideal versus real timelines based on previous major event experiences, but I´d also like to see their credentials, including maybe an MBA in delusional thinking and a Masters in divination.
Such a person might, in fact, be interested to hear that the apparently massively successful Soccer City stadium from the Cup just gone, or Allianz Arena in Munich for Cup 2006, or the Sydney 2000 Olympic Stadium, or a whole bunch of the world´s greatest sports facilities, all took around two and a half years from ground breaking to opening. Whoa, Nellie. That means, hang on, two and half years is like 30 months, and Brazil has 46 months, leaving, ah 16 months difference.
Okay, so FIFA wants a December 2012 deadline, 19 full months before the 2014 Cup, but that seems a bit silly don´t you think, particularly considering the successful stadia mentioned above opened between eight and 15 months from their respective opening ceremonies. No, are you sure? Now I´m no major events guru but combining that revolutionary research with the fact that a host of Brazil’s 12 stadia projects have already started and the remainder are scheduled to begin ASAP, while also keeping in mind that all three of the major events mentioned above were considered grand successes, and you might just think that Brazil still has a reasonable chance. Sure, meeting FIFA´s enlightened December 2012 deadline, which would allow all twelve stadia to compete to host those all important Confederations Cup 2013 matches, might be a touch and go proposition from here on in, but hey, nobody´s perfect.
Okay then, there will be time, there may be time, you say, but has the work really started and will it be, you know, okay? This is Brazil after all. Harking back to the misinformed critics, you will find that most commentaries over the last few weeks have delighted in the fact that “substantial work on stadiums has yet to start” and that many projects haven´t even left the paper. Thanks for the update. Addressing the first point, work, as ‘unsubstantial’ as it is, is indeed already underway on four of the stadia and no, that’s not just a few council workers taking sledgehammers to the old toilet blocks but actual construction companies, some are even multi-national consortia, which have won proper tenders and are now on site.
Of the others, all but two of the projects are ready and for these either the selected builders are awaiting final government go ahead (damned transparency, again) or the tender process is still in motion, with start dates set for the near future. Of the remaining two, the Curitiba stadium upgrade has just overcome some political snags to confirm its place in the 2014 Cup and things should be full steam ahead from here, although as the simplest and cheapest of all twelve projects there is every chance it will still be the first ready. The final and probably most important host city project is the one big problem, but we’ll get to that in a second.
For the eleven projects described above the local organising committees are still predicting their original and you might say overly-optimistic FIFA deadlines of December 2012 will still be met, so, we might at least get one or two ready by the end of 2012, with a few others trickling in during 2013. Hell, they all might even be ready on time, no really. Whatever the actual outcome, it is ridiculous to already be suggesting, as is currently in fashion, that four of the projects will be cut or there´ll be paint still drying everywhere come June 2014, in 46 months time, a worst-case scenarios which, even so, still leaves over 12 months available for Brazilian stuffing around.
To get to the one major stadium problem, Sao Paulo, the Southern Hemisphere´s largest city with a greater metropolitan population around that of Australia, continues without a facility worthy of hosting even a first round World Cup finals match, an extraordinary fact in itself given it is currently the planet´s tenth richest city and could be the sixth by 2025 behind Tokyo, New York City, Los Angeles, London and Chicago. Bewilderment aside, the dilemma is again largely based on politics, those of both football and public office, and it is really quite difficult to imagine a city in the ranks of those mentioned above not, when push comes to shove, coming up with a solution and in 46 month´s time hosting some of the 2014 Cup´s key matches or even the opening ceremony, for which it is currently out of the running. News is breaking every day about this issue and just this week President Lula heaped some significant pressure on the Sao Paulo government to come up with a solution; definitely something to watch very closely over the coming months.
Besides stadia, which are the most media friendly measures of readiness but are ultimately less crucial to Brazil´s preparations than more general infrastructure works, the concept of being late or behind schedule can only be considered in relation to the country´s status as a developing nation. The B in BRIC, Brazil is (for the moment) behind developed nations on many fronts and that has certainly made its 2014 World Cup preparations all the more important but it has also made them all the more complex and ambitious. With a record 12 World Cup host cities to be used, Brazil
More specifically, earlier this week the final two parts of a R$20+ billion financing agreement were enacted by the three tiers of government. As mentioned briefly above, this arrangement, called the Matrix of Responsibilities, covers dozens of World Cup infrastructure projects across airports, ports, urban mobility, hotels and stadia, many of which have already started. The unprecedented agreement has of course taken some time to nail down, and while it would have been great to have finalised it sooner (ideally a few weeks after it won the hosting rights), it could also be said that Brazil has done well to reach such a position within a realistic timeframe to meet its lofty targets of December 2012 for stadia and June 2013 for everything else. These targets remain in place and, similar to the stadia situation already mentioned, many have either left the paper or a close to a start date. While some may well run into troubles and be pushed closer to the June 2014 Cup opening, does it really seem, taking everything above into account, like things are in such a bad state for Brazil 2014?
At the end of the day, the 2014 World Cup has already mobilised massive amounts of cash and political will to address many of Brazil´s most critical problems, a situation that simply would not have arisen, at least not on such a scale, without the pressure of having to host the greatest show on Earth. As Brazil now begins its first steps under the full glare of the World Cup spotlight, there are plenty of reasons to feel it will come out on top come 2014, or at least put in a strong performance with just the odd hiccup, which would still be a great result for a country with so much already on its plate. Either way, with the country finally shaking off the shackles of its oft-disheartening past, it is sometimes difficult to understand why foreigners and locals alike continue to be so pessimistically one sided when it comes to analysing Brazil’s chances.
Simon Tarmo is an Australian journalist who has been living in Brazil
