Qatar did not imagine, in 2010, when he won the battle for the allocation of the 2022 Football World Cup, that such a chappe of distrust would weigh on the most watched competition of the planet on the eve of its opening. Instead of offering a welcome parenthesis in the disorders of the world, for the greatest benefit of the international image of this rich micro-state to billions, it has become, on the contrary, the mirror of its misfortunes.
The previous World Cup, in Russia, had benefited from the usual preferential treatment for these major meetings in which sport goes with political influence. Vladimir Putin had already converted to imperial nationalism. Russia had invaded neighboring countries while eliminating, in the strong way, its dissidents. Qatar does not enjoy this great power privilege.
The emirate would not have achieved his ends without the manifestly interested assistance of Western intermediaries and more precisely French. Nice illustration of the double language consisting in having the king’s money coexist with the main principles: today, Western lessons in good governance and exemplarity are no longer deemed credible. The recent statements by Emmanuel Macron saying that we must not “politicize sport”, while the major world sporting events have often been an opportunity to defend major causes, add to discomfort.
It is all the more ironic since the indignation aroused by the errors of the organization of the competition is mainly Western. “The rest” (of the world), a geopolitical concept that we now oppose to “West”, highlighted by the Russian war in Ukraine and the wait -and -see attitude of a majority of southern countries, is much more Indignation economy.
the Qatari mirage
The truth also obliges that this attribution, when it had been announced, had aroused more questions about the fate that would be reserved for players in a region known for its high temperatures, and on sports calendar problems , that on the disastrous ecological assessment that this choice was going to train. The latter variable was then considered secondary. Twelve years later, this World Cup appears on this point as the perfect example of what should now be avoided, without being sure that the lesson is learned.
Part of the accusations of the twenty-fifth hour worn today against the close conservatism of the emirate, especially on gender issues, could have been anticipated if we had not been blinded, then, by The Qatari Mirage: First of the Arab shore of the Gulf to organize very symbolic municipal elections, champion of the soft power and haven of a television channel, Al-Jazira, then celebrated for an unprecedented regional freedom, Exception of Qatari affairs.
Qatar himself should have taken the deep implications of his prestigious activism seriously. Ensuring decent living conditions for the workers he recruits would have allowed him, at low cost, with regard to his resources, to avoid the trial in quasi-slavagism regularly educated in the region about the workforce expatriate from Asia. Finding accommodation to ensure the best possible cohabitation between the conservatism of the emirate and the reception of the citizens of the world could also have been carried on his credit. He simply did not feel the utility.