Insipid circus
When the open protests from the Black Stars players got diffused, the Deputy Minister of Youth and Sports, Joseph Yamin, said a plane had been chartered to transport the money to Brazil. Some took it for a joke.
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Others thought it was a ploy by the government to get the players to focus on the Portugal match. It turned out that we had put out a puerile and most insipid circus.
When the players received the money, some of them acted as if they had never seen money before, although it was far lower than the weekly wages from their clubs. That meant there was a collective action, not a unilateral act by any deviant or rubble rouser.
It is thus unfortunate that Sulley Muntari became an odd character and had to be sacrificed in the name of discipline. It represented what one great philosopher had admonished us against, never to “mix bad words with your bad mood. You will have many opportunities to change a mood, but you will never get the opportunity to replace the words you spoke.” Sulley is reported to have assaulted a management committee member of the Black Stars.
Another puerile act is the racist laced statistics, the base data of pitching African footballers in a global setting as if it is a contest between Africans. Why should any African journalist magnify a Euro-centric statement about which African player has scored more goals, limiting it to our continent.
Asamoah Gyan is not competing against Roger Milla. If James Rodriguez of Columbia has scored five goals in the current World Cup in Brazil, why should we eulogise Asamoah Gyan as an outstanding player for scoring six goals between 2006 and 2014.
The African media should not help diffuse such wanton discrimination, misrepresentation and distortion of facts such as the history that David Livingstone discovered the Zambesi River, although he met people living along the banks and was directed towards the river
Such misinformed, ill-informed and mal-informed data derailed the Black Stars chance to reach the semi- finals in South Africa 2010. Yet, they were pampered for equaling a meaningless African record.
Our media personnel must be wary of dysfunctional compliments which debase the African. These were some of the factors culminating in the New World Information and Communication Order, a major issue which engaged the attention of the UNESCO.
Returning to the Black Stars, how come that there were more officials than players and the technical team. And what about the claim that whilst the players were in economy class, some of the officials were in business class.
More important, the prolonged presence of the Minister of Youth and Sports with the team reduced his influence on the players. Otherwise, the President would not have been directly involved in negotiations with the players. That confirmed the saying of our elders that familiarity breeds contempt.
This is what Joseph Addison puts another way when he submits that, “admiration is a very short-lived passion that immediately decays upon growing familiar with its object.”
For, how could the Minister of Youth and Sports leave the country and set camp with the Black Stars from Holland through the United States to Brazil and spend public money to travel from Brazil to hold a press conference in Accra and return to Brazil? That is also part of the circus we put up towards the World Cup.
Indeed, the clowning commenced when Yamin said majority of the supporters to be sent to Brazil would be members of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), as a reward. He had earlier said the NDC had scored twice and New Patriotic Party (NPP) once as if qualification to the World Cup was a partisan contest.
The performance of the Stars against Portugal could be solidarity between the players and their colleagues who were disciplined. Whilst no one should disdain discipline, those hailing the management for not sparing the rod must equally demand thorough investigations and one measuring rod of discipline for all Ghanaians, players, technical team and managers of our national teams. For as Ecclesiastes 7:20 maintains, “ for there is not a just man upon earth that does good and does not sin.”
Long after the Brazil 2014, the insipid and puerile records will be continue. The bestialism of Luiz Suarez would be held against him personally, but not blamed on Uruguay nor South America.
Africa, however, will be held liable for the head butting between two Cameroonian players and Ghana’ s ludicrous exercise of transporting millions of United States Dollars against basic rules of money laundering, Hollywood style, open to television cameras beamed live across the globe with a retinue of security escorts.