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NEWS > EVERYONE ELSE > ARAB SPRING UPRISING KILLS DOZENS AT SOCCER MATCH
ARAB SPRING UPRISING KILLS DOZENS AT SOCCER MATCH
February 2 2012
Cairo, Egypt – It really was a special time early last year when riots started to unseat dictators across North Africa, a sight to behold, and a truly historical happening. Much of that has stalled recently, resulting in war in Libya and chaos in the Middle East but for a brief time it appeared that things were really changing, that people were really taking back their countries.
Easily the most shocking and compelling of those uprisings was in Egypt which for years had been run by a largely malevolent dictator that the world simply tolerated. Hosni Mubarak was a bad guy, no doubt, and the world knew it, but to paraphrase Franklin Roosevelt he was their bad guy. Seeing him run from power was both glorious and frightening at the same time.
Now Mubarak is gone for good and Egypt will have to determine where it goes in the future, an effort which will be watched by many interested parties both as a security concern and as a template for the future. Whatever the end results, it is clear that the spirit of the Arab Spring, of rebellion, is alive and well, and is even still active today as displayed by a massive soccer riot which left dozens dead and a nation now at odds with lousy officiating.
“We believe this is something that has been well-organized. I'm sure there are some hidden hands behind this, but we cannot really see, or we cannot really confirm, who is behind all that,” said Khaled Mortagy of the Al-Ahly team which was on the receiving end of the rioters rage. “It's a big catastrophe for Egyptian sports ... a black day for football.”
At least 79 people have been killed and 47 injured in the riots which were likely sparked by one team losing, a common occurrence in sporting matches.
Many of the dead were crushed by stampedes, something which is common in soccer matches pretty much the world over.
“On the surface you would have to say that this is an anomaly, a horrible thing but that’s only if you forget that it’s soccer. I mean this is what happens in soccer matches. This may be a bigger death toll than normal but it’s still soccer. I personally wouldn’t really tie this to the Arab spring but the officiating was lousy, I can tell you that,” said Scrape TV International analyst Gustav Hander. “These are two blood rivals and in cases like that, especially with soccer, you need to have the best officials on the case and that doesn’t appear to be what happened here. It’s pretty clear that a lot of calls were made in favour of Al-Masry and that caused a lot of tension, resulting in the riots.”
It’s not believed that the officials for the game were injured. They are now in hiding in the north of the country.
“That is the greatest lesson people in Egypt should have learned from the uprisings last year. The simple fact of the matter is that people in that country are not going to take imbalance and authoritarian rule anymore and that they will fight violently to end it if needed,” continued Hander. “Unfortunately corruption in Egypt is a way of life and it is going to take a lot of time and effort to get rid of that completely. Until then there will likely be more incidents like this. At least, though, it shows that the spirit of the uprising has not left even if it has mutated slightly.”
Mubarak, currently on trial and hospitalized, has sided with the referees.
Emil Uliya, International Correspondent
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