When an international sporting event comes to town, that
often
means heavy-handed
repression (and other
problems) for people unfortunate enough to live in the host
city. With São Paulo preparing to present the upcoming FIFA
World Cup, for example, Al Jazeera
reports that Brazil’s congress has passed a law restricting
local street vendors from selling their
wares within a two-kilometre radius of FIFA’s restricted zones.
These zones are heavily militarised by local security forces.Opponents of FIFA…said preparations for the Cup have also led the
government to
evict residents from their homes in exchange for commercial
development and increasing real-estate values….The government has denied forcibly evicting families from their
homes without due process, or for the sole purpose of
infrastructure projects related to the World Cup and
Olympics.Activists dispute the government’s claims. Maria do Socorro, a
co-organiser and resident of a favela named Indiana, has had to
fight to keep her three-story house where she has lived since she
was six years old.
Activists are protesting the regulations and evictions in an
interesting way: They’ve organized an alternative tournament.
According to Al Jazeera, the players are
men and women of all ages from Rio’s many favelas, poor
communities that surround the city.La Copa Popular, or the People’s Cup, is hosted by the activist
group People’s Committee of the World Cup and Olympics and is in
its second year.The qualifying tournament for this year’s Copa Popular finals took
place at the top of the Morro do Salgueiro favela in northern Rio,
and the finals will be held on June 8.
A similar event was held in South Africa when the World Cup was
played there in 2010. Then as now, the aim was “to protest
evictions, removals, and the barring of local venders from
designated FIFA areas”—and presumably to have some fun playing
too.
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