30 Daze

With one month to go until kickoff all the talk is about infrastructure projects delivered or not delivered, costs, stadiums, legacy, protests, who will win, etc. There are a few talking points being left out of the debate.

Which projects are (not) being completed and why?

More than half of the WC infrastructure projects that were part of the Matrix of Responsibilities that each city signed as part of the “host-city agreement” with FIFA have not happened. This includes a monorail in Manaus, a light rail in Cuiabá, the 1.5 km extension of the metro in Salvador, reforms to Rio´s port, airport projects, 4G communications and numerous Bus Rapid Transit lines. There are two things to consider: a) why were these projects chosen, by whom and how and b) why didn´t they get done and what are the consequences?

In the case of Rio, a major bus line that was projected in the 1960s was finally brought into being. It connects the international airport with Barra da Tijuca in the southwest part of the city. It cuts through dense neighborhood fabric, has removed tens of thousands of people and will not attend the tourist or commuter demands of the city. Why a bus line from the 1960s to a distant suburb where no residents use public transportation? Why not an expansion of the metro to the international airport? Why not new ferry lines? In short, the lingering questions about “legacy” are going to be answered in a few years, as Jerome Valcke recently said. The implication is that Brazilians shouldn´t protest now because we don´t know how things are going to turn out. Already, the evidence points to a legacy fail of historic proportions.

But if we take Valcke´s advice and wait to see what happens, surely we can look at what has happened with the projects that have been delivered.

The projects that have been delivered, such as stadiums, have not functioned to attract “families back to football”, as the event organizers have suggested. FIFA suggests that these “better facilities” will “welcome more fans, because the structure is nicer and have a higher standard of international football.” Please.

The quality of the Brazilian league may be at its lowest point in fifty years. The data show that attendances are lower and ticket prices higher than all of the major football leagues in the world. Indeed, Brazil has the highest ticket prices in the world relative to minimum wage. The new stadiums have been privatized and the teams prefer to have fewer, wealthier fans in the stadium. Why? For every fan, the teams pay insurance and security costs. Therefore 10,000 fans at R$50 generates more money than 20,000 at R$25. 

Year	Total Public	Average  Public		Total gate receipts (R$)	Average ticket price (R$)
2007	6,582,976	17,461	80,040,848		12.2
2008	6,439,854	16,992	101,241,490		15.7
2009	6,766,471	17,807	125,764,391		18.6
2010	5,638,806	14,839	112,873,893		20.0
2011	5,660,987	14,976	117,665,714		20.8
2012	4,928,827	12,970	119,100,000		22.92
2013	5,681,355	14,951	176,500,000		31.06

Data taken from the CBF website and compiled by me.

If we take out the novelty of visiting new stadiums, and the fact that the big teams are playing outside of their home cities and attracting bigger crowds through novelty, the 2013 Brasilierão would have been worse than the numbers here show. If we take into account items such as transportation, food and parking then average costs are much higher. In short, the promise that families would flock back to the stadiums because of increased comfort and security did not and will not materialize as long as the level of play is so bad and the prices are so exorbitant.

Yesterday, I returned to the Favela do Metrô-Mangueira. The city has removed the majority of the favela to make way for undefined and uncompleted projects. We were warned of all the cracudos lingering in the trash and sewage filled alleyways.  The scene was one of utter destruction and desperation.

Passing by the Maracanã metrô station, I was astounded to see that a huge construction project had gotten underway in the three weeks since I had last been there. It seems impossible that the integration of the train and metro stations will happen in a month.

Inside the Maracanã, the press handlers were frantically trying to keep us from touching the grass at the edge of the technical area. “Only players” was the mantra, as security guards stomped around the edge of the pitch. The gaggle of neurotic pr flacks was desperately trying to create some kind of religious iconography out of a patch of grass in a historic place that has been sanitized and deracinated. Not 500 meters from that very spot, people are struggling for their lives amidst scenes of destruction and ruin.

One month from the Cup, the questions should be about infrastructure and preparedness, but we must first consider what has Brazil (not) prepared, how and for whom.

How did you like the play Ms. Lincoln?

The last World Cup host without a functional first division was the United States in 1994. There were second and third divisions, but no first. In Brazil, none of the CBF´s four divisions started without legal disputes, the state tournaments have become a disgrace and the organizational frameworks of Brazilian sport have rarely been less transparent or more chaotic. Last week, the presidency of the CBF passed from the octogenarian Jumpin´ José Marin (@seeadarkness) to the septuagenarian Marco del Nero. Upon assuming the presidency in an uncontested election, del Nero said that there “would be no changes because things are going very well.” SQN (só que não, “not”, for those putting together a #WC14 Brazilian twitter vocabulary).

Fluminense, whose principal sponsor is UniMed, was saved from relegation because their lawyers convinced the CBF´s sports tribunal that a smaller team should be sent down because the CBF (having just received millions for a UniMed sponsorship) hadn´t informed that team about the status of a player that was sent on as substitute in the last fifteen minutes of the last game of the season. The Portuguesa directorship fought a bit, and then capitulated. Last week, a fan filed a law suit to continue the battle for permanence in the first division and as the first round of the second division was into its 15^th minute, someone walked legal papers onto the field and the Portuguesa coach took his team to the locker room. The fans were not pleased. This happened in the same stadium where Vasco and Atlético Paranaense organizadas tried to kill each other at the end of last season [ed: thanks to the anonymous comment at the end of this post, the plot is revealed as much more complicated than I describe here and also involves Flamengo and millions deposited in Portuguesa bank accounts. Follow this link to a timeline (in portuguese) of the events]. 

There were also legal battles to determine which teams would play in the 3^rd and 4^th divisions. The CBF manipulated and massaged the tournaments into the form and format that best serves OGlobo and the sponsors. The season will be cut into bits by the World Cup, players will be sold to Europe, Asia and the Middle East in August, attendances are miserable, the stadiums are privatized and sanitized, the football is terrible, the rich teams close ranks within the CBF, there is no transparency, kids are regularly and ritually abused in the youth systems and the October presidential elections may depend on Neymar´s 4^th metatarsal. The state of football in the country of football frustrates and depresses in equal measure.

Brazil continues to struggle with the legacy of the 1964-1985 dictatorship. All dictatorships are necessarily anti-intellectual and the evisceration of public education continues to resonate in the halls of power. It is almost fair to say that the leaders and elites of Brazil were educated not to be critical, progressive thinkers and did not develop the necessary skills to deal effectively with complex problems. They also carry with them a very anti-educational cultural perspective that is reflected in the media, in the public education system and in the knee-jerk violent reactions to public crises (aka, send in the shock troops). This is not to suggest that there are not Brazilian intellectuals but rather that the fetishization of a president with a fourth grade education because he is “of the people” is an indication of the level at which most public discourse occurs.

This week I returned to the Favela do Metrô, 500 meters distant from the Maracanã. When I last wrote about Metrô in 2011, the community was under attack from the city government, supposedly to clear the way for a FIFA parking lot. The city behind its internationally acclaimed (sqn) mayor dissimulated, sowed discontent, bulldozed and left the wreckage behind. The majority of residents were eventually able to move into decent public housing across the tracks, but only after years of delay, a lack of transparency and immensely tiring and emotionally draining fights. Now, returning to the place where I once gave an extension course from the nearby university, there are growing piles of trash and a fetid crackolândia. Most readers will never have visited a crackolândia and I do not recommend it. It is the end of the line dominated by young drug traffickers that have no education and less interest. The burned out shells of humans carry deadened eyes that would reveal the depths of despair if one could bear to look at them. The Brazilian reaction to what I am writing will be:  “You feel sorry for them? Take them home.” Thing is, many of these people had homes before the government destroyed them in the name of progress. Worse, there is no project to turn the area into something with even marginal utility for the World Cup. It is simply destroyed and left to fester.

As the saying goes, if you´re not outraged you´re not paying attention. The World Cup is one of the great collective cultural experiences that we as humans have managed to put together. However, the use of the tournament to consolidate wealth and power at the expense of the cities, countries and people that host it must come to an immediate end. The business model of the World Cup creates notions of distinctiveness and religious fervor at the same time that it thrives in vacuums of responsibility and regimes of exception.

For example, FIFA is parading its trophy around the world as if it is a religious object. Only heads of state and world cup winners are allowed to touch it. Seriously. People buy into this hokum but never ask who the poor sot was that put the trophy on display, or why. The entire World Cup can only come into being because Brazilian elites signed laws giving the shop away to FIFA through the Lei Geral da Copa. FIFA isn´t responsible for stadium construction, yet their demands drive the architectural projects which are heralded as “sustainable”. The cities and states aren´t responsible for the scope and scale of the projects because they have to meet FIFA demands. The federal government can´t intervene in the running of the national football leagues because they would be sanctioned by FIFA. And around we go. There is neither credibility nor accountability, just rentability.

The tensions are palpable in Brazil as the #WC14 rumbles towards us. Buses are burning in the suburbs and in Copacabana. Dozens were killed in Salvador when the police went on strike. The poor, expelled from their homes, see even the churches close their doors to them. The middle classes are being squeezed though rent and daily living price increases. Traffic jams and high taxes are the existential condition in Brazil. Public works that could have brought long-term benefits are fragmenting neighborhoods instead of creating wide-reaching mobility networks. The militarization of cities is happening in concert with the privatization of public spaces. It´s not all the fault of #WC14 but nature does abhor a vacuum.

Favela do Metrô

Today’s adventure was a visit to the Favela do Metrô, where I met with a group of aspiring documentary film makers associated with the Cinema Nosso school in Rio. The Favela do Metrô has been a continual target of the municipal government and the Municipal Housing Secretary (SMH).  Tom Phillips and Douglas Engle produced an excellent piece for the Guardian about the destruction of the houses in the community. What happened was that the SMH came with offers of “resettlement” in the Morar Carioca program in Cosmos, 70 km to the west. About 100 of the 400 families in the Community took them up on the offer. As soon as they signed the papers and gathered their belongings, the SMH came in and destroyed their homes. The Guardian video is well worth watching and I am adding to the tale here with a few pictures of my own. The sense of helplessness was palpable and most residents expressed a sense of tremendous insecurity about the future. 

This is the wall framing the entrance to the community. It doesn't leave much doubt about the way that people here feel about the way things are going. 

Eduardo Paes (mayor) is the enemy of the people!

No to the removal of the Community of the Metro!

The President of the Comunidade do Metro residents' association explains the process by which the sMH comes in and spraypaints the houses marked for removal. The yellow paint under the SMH is intended to cover up the numbers to make the work of the SMH more difficult. These marks are eerily reminiscent of a certain tactic used by a certin unsavory government in the 1930s to mark the houses of an undesired population. 

The results are not encouraging. The houses on either side of those destroyed have had their structural integrity compromised. Instead of cleaning up the mess they created, the SMH simply leaves the rubble behind. This devalorizes the area, creates health risks and generally makes everything worse than it was before. This process will likely continue until the area is "cleaned" in order to make way for remote parking for the Maracanã. There are no clear ways to resolve to a very large problematic, only hair-brained solutions and gestapo tactics coming from a short-sighted and callous government. 

Liticia getting water from a hole in the wall next to a recently destroyed house.