A Rugby League World Cup in the UAE would be both political and criminal

The idea that sporting events should be apolitical is an excuse used by nasty people to get away with doing nasty things that they shouldn’t be doing to people who deserve better.

Politicians don’t shy away from sports. They arrange themselves on the front row, taking selfies with their slack jawed colleagues and throwing popcorn at the plebs below. Or worse – they host the events, taking the glory for themselves.

Ancient Athenian politicians didn’t throw sporting tournaments for the hell of it, they did it to foster a strong sense of citizen identity, and show the Spartans that they meant business on the battlefield. Despite living in a democracy, most Athenians were poor, ill and disenfranchised. Sport was a way to distract them from these realities. Likewise, Roman emperors didn’t throw lavish gladiatorial games for kicks, they did it because Rome was ruled by a populist mob who needed entertaining.

Sport is, on the whole, an accessible event that can be watched by anyone in person or on the TV, or listened to on the radio. Every single spectator or listener is, to a greater, lesser or minimal extent, political. They have views on the world. It is not for FIFA, that bastion of ethics, or other such organisations, to say when someone can and can’t have a view on the world. People can’t switch off their political allegiances and ideas for ninety-minute segments of their lives. Sport is historical, emotional, exciting and adversarial, but not a recipe for calm.

For those who say that sport should remain apolitical, would they re-install South Korean dictator Chun Doo Hwan, who fell from power after demonstrations sparked by the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games? Or maybe re-introduce South African apartheid, a brutal political reality the demise of which was contributed to by international boycotts of athletics, cricket and rugby in which the country’s athletes took part? Should black American athletes, raising their fists in salute at the 1968 Olympic Games, have kept their complaints about racism in the locker room? Maybe we should ignore the fact that international athletics coach to the stars and serial doping fiend Ekkart Arbeit used to be a spy for the East German Stasi. Should the 2011 Egyptian revolutionaries in Tahrir Square have rejected the assistance of battle-hardened Egyptian football fans, experienced in dealing with police onslaughts, purely on the grounds that they liked football? Perhaps the Palestinian Football Association should just give up on campaigning against Israeli FIFA membership; apartheid may not be fair, but who brings that up in a football match? Pah!

It works both ways: Russia and China have used the Olympic Games to paint a picture of themselves on the world stage as modernisers, with varying degrees of success. Adolf Hitler used the 1936 Olympics to show off his flawed understanding of human genetics. Libya’s Colonel Qaddafi would use football and basketball to instil patriotism, threatening players with death if they didn’t perform.

In general, the only time you’ll hear someone say “But sport should be apolitical” is when they are asking you to ignore some egregious abuses which happen to be going on just outside the stadium. It’s a similar linguistic sleight of hand to “It’s for the greater good” (always said earnestly when something very, very, bad is happening).

This is an important issue, for it’s looking increasingly likely that the United Arab Emirates will bid to host the 2021 Rugby League World Cup. This isn’t for the greater good, and it’s certainly not apolitical. The UAE has potentially a very horrid reputation for human rights abuses, similar to that of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, but has been far more successful in covering it up. Away from the glitz and glamour of Abu Dhabi and Dubai, the lesser known and poorer Emirates are festering with dissent. A vicious crackdown on those who speak out against the regime is ramping up. A month ago, human rights lawyer Mohammed Al-Roken spent his one thousandth day as a prisoner of conscience. The secret police have started to target women for the first time, notably the sisters of an imprisoned activist who three months ago were forcibly disappeared after one tweeted “I miss my brother”. Show trials and torture are very much part of the playbook. Those reformists who can are fleeing, many to London. And like any major construction work in the Middle East, building new stadiums for the World Cup will inevitably lead to the debt servitude, virtual slavery or even death of South Asian migrant workers.

Of course money talks. My appeal to common humanity when allocating which country should host the World Cup of such a noble sport as rugby league will probably fall on deaf ears. While it’s a reality that there is a significant minority of Emiratis calling for reform, many have cushy lives, a good education and near guaranteed employment. The impetus for change is not quite there, especially in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

Nevertheless, rugby league fans and administrators should think carefully about awarding UAE the World Cup. It’s great if sport is politicised to effect positive change, as it has been on so many occasions, but when it’s used to cut the other way, to whitewash, to obscure reality, to make a country seem good when it is anything but, it is a crime. If the Rugby League World Cup authorities don’t want to be accomplices in that crime, they should reject the UAE’s application.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.