By Clare Byrne, DPA,
Johannesburg : It was two months before the 2010 World Cup and there was a whiff of panic in the air.
Half a million tickets were still unsold, raising the spectre of a large number of empty seats in the 10 stunning stadiums that were built or upgraded at huge cost for the first World Cup in Africa.
All eyes were on the hosts. Would they come to the rescue and snap up the unsold tickets?
South Africa’s dream of turning on its head the stock African story of disappointment and failure depended on it.
In the event, South Africans didn’t disappoint.
Within 24 hours of the remaining tickets going on sale over the counter April 15, they had pocketed nearly 100,000 tickets after standing in line for up to 20 hours outside ticketing centres across the country.
It wasn’t long before sales of the 2.88 million World Cup tickets had passed the 90 per cent mark, with South Africans accounting for over 1 million.
After disappointing ticket sales in Europe the blushes of the government and the football’s ruling body FIFA had been spared by the patriotism of a people that aren’t really so mad about football as about the idea of nation-building.
Sport has played a big part in the project to reconcile the white minority and previously disenfranchised black majority. A year into democracy in 1995, South Africa’s home victory in the rugby World Cup produced unprecedented scenes of unified rejoicing.
Hosting the world’s biggest sporting event is seen as another opportunity to make common cause.
“I just want to say I was part of it,” is an oft-heard refrain among young South Africans.
Across the country tens of thousands of people have taken to wearing a yellow South African football jersey to work on “Football Fridays” and blowing vuvuzelas – the plastic trumpet previously associated with hard-core football fans.
“We cannot wait for the 11th of June,” Danny Jordaan, chief executive of the World Cup local organizing committee said at the one-month-to-go mark, referring to South Africa’s opening game against Mexico.
By contrast, FIFA’s point man on the World Cup, secretary-general Jerome Valcke, can’t wait for the final whistle.
“My dream is to be on July 11 midnight,” the Frenchman told a meeting of the Foreign Correspondents Association of Southern Africa in May, where he admitted that organising this World Cup had been a slog.
For the first time in years FIFA had had to get stuck into development issues such as transportation and telecommunication – issues that didn’t arise at the last World Cup in Germany.
With less than two weeks to go, transport was still a weak link, despite enormous improvements.
A new high-speed train will begin service between Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International Airport and Sandton business and hotel district three days before the World Cup, and a new bus rapid-transit system now links central Johannesburg with Soccer City and Ellis Park, the city’s two World Cup venues.
But the around 300,000 foreign fans expected at the tournament will still be largely dependent on cars and buses to get around, making huge traffic jams a near certainty.
Had the 450,000 foreign supporters initially forecast by South Africa come to the party, the difficulties would have been exacerbated.
In the end, many fans in Germany, England especially chose to sit this World Cup out at home, citing either the high cost of attending the tournament or concerns about South Africa’s high crime rates.
Their no-show has forced hotels in Cape Town and Durban to slash their prices in an attempt to fill empty rooms.
FIFA has blamed the global downturn for the disappointing numbers but the organization’s ticketing strategy has also been blamed.
Only around 40,000 tickets were sold in the rest of Africa, despite Africa sending a total of six teams to the finals. African fans complained they couldn’t afford the tickets reserved for non-South Africans and were sold chiefly over the internet, despite most of the continent having no internet access.
FIFA has acknowledged its mistake and promised a complete rethink before the 2014 tournament in Brazil.
For the rest it’s all systems go as the 32 participating teams, led by Australia and Brazil, begin to arrive.
Some 44,000 police and thousands of private security guards will be watching over the players, officials and fans at stadiums, team hotels, fan parks and public viewing areas in nine host cities.
While 43 leaders have confirmed their attendance, US President Barack Obama and frail former president Nelson Mandela are still keeping everyone guessing.
Faced with the enormous task of protecting a US president, South African police say jokingly they are crossing their fingers for a quick US exit.