Racism in football: A virus we have to kill

Photo Credit: bbc.co.uk

Football is universally and deservedly known as the ‘beautiful game,’ but even the most beautiful of things have ugly defects, and football has racism. There was the Buenos Aires Resolution, which was passed by the Extraordinary Congress of FIFA during a monumental meeting in the Argentinian capital on 7th July, 2001. After more than a decade, does it look like football has done enough to eliminate this virus? Football is rife with a shocking level of “institutional discrimination.”

Figures published by the International Federation of Football history and statistics  earlier this month showed that black people or the minority, as they are known,  currently fill just under four per cent of backroom staff positions in the five top European football  Football Leagues.

'Football has failed to complete the promise of true equality. At this rate, it does not look like that promise will be realized soon.  FIFA did not take action over offensive chanting by Mexican fans, racist chanting at matches involving Russia, Cameroon and Croatia, or “blacked up” fans who were pictured at the Germany versus Ghana game. Both happened during the just ended FIFA world cup tournament held in Brazil.

FIFA’s Disciplinary Committee Chairman, Claudio Sulser, dismissed criticism of the decision not to take action over the “inappropriate” and “inconvenient’ behaviour of fans. He said it was hard to prove cases that involved racist or homophobic behaviour by the crowd because it was not easy to tell which country the offenders were from. Sulser also queried whether it was effective to sanction national associations with a fine in cases where their fans misbehave and, bizarrely, argued that unless it could be proven that the chanting was against a specific player then it was hard for FIFA to take action. Most disappointing is the game's overall refusal, up to this point, to engage in some dialogue which challenges the decision-makers and leadership of the game, rather than focusing on the victims of these practices.  

The following is a six-point action plan to deal with racism in a bid to eliminate this cancer from our beautiful game.

Ø  Speeding up the process of dealing with reported racist abuse with close monitoring of any incidents.

Ø  Consideration of stiffer penalties for racist abuse and to include an equality awareness programme for culprits and clubs involved.

Ø  A soccer  form of the 'Rooney rule' - introduced by the NFL in America in 2003 - to make sure qualified black coaches are on interview lists for job vacancies.

Ø  The proportion of black coaches and managers to be monitored and any inequality or progress highlighted.

Ø  Racial abuse to be considered gross misconduct in player and coach contracts (and therefore potentially a sackable offence).

Ø  To not lose sight of other equality issues such as gender, sexual orientation, disability, anti-semitism in football.

    GODFRED SCHANDORF

    SOCCER ANALYST AND PUNDIT