Ambassador Of South Africa In Spain (Embassy OF SOUTH AFRICA IN SPAIN)

There are many comments wondering if South Africa would be ready to stage the World Cup. However, the FIFA CEO, Mr. Joseph (Sepp) Blatter (02-03-10) said that “We are proud and happy that this love story is becoming a real wedding party”. How optimistic are you about this?

I think Mr. Blatter would definitely not lie about the state of South Africa preparedness for the Football World Cup 2010, you have to take into consideration that the FIFA World Cup is the property of FIFA, not of South Africa. South Africa is just a venue, but the actual ownership of the program is FIFA and they are a big international brand, they would then not do anything that will jeopardize their own brand, so when Mr. Blatter says “Yes, South Africa is ready” it means that he has certified himself that everything is being done according to plan.

Now, everything is basically finished, some of the stadiums were even used for the confederations Cup which was held in South Africa and everybody was happy about the result. There was only one stadium which had not been totally completed and that was the Mbombela Stadium, but apart from that everything else was finished.

Also, remember we are using eleven stadiums in different regions and Germany used only six stadiums to host the previous Football World Cup in 2006. Even if Mbombela stadium for example wouldn’t be ready, we would still have other stadiums ready. There is no way there would be any problem concerning that matter, particularly because our government has contributed with financial and human resources. This is not just a private initiative, our government is also supporting it because we have a political and socio-economic interest in the hosting of the Football World Cup. We are aware that to change the image of Africa can’t be done instantly, we want to make sure we do a good job because we know it will not only be reflected on South Africa, but on the rest of the African continent, and most importantly, on FIFA.



South Africa will host the Football World Cup in 2010. This will be the first time that this event takes place on the African continent. Do you see South Africa as a role model?

We thought from the very beginning that we had to leave a legacy in Africa. What we have done together with FIFA, is to build stadiums, in countries like Namibia and Mozambique, we have helped to improve their hotel facilities, to make sure that, if your hotel is accredited as a four star hotel, is meets all the four star international requirements. That’s why we helped all the hotels both in South Africa, as well as in the neighboring countries to comply with the international standards.

Indeed, some of the visitors that will be coming for the Football World Cup will be watching their teams playing maybe once every 1 or 2 weeks and they might want to visit in the meantime countries such as Botswana, Mozambique or Zimbabwe. We believe then that from a tourism perspective this initiative is going to be positive.

Another important point is that part of the money coming from the ticket sales is to be used towards financing programs and projects designed to combat HIV/AIDS, which not only benefits South Africa but also the rest of the region, we are talking about programs to empower women and unprivileged.

Having said that I have to add that that as far as we are concerned, we don’t only think in terms of what will happen during the Football World Cup but also what will happen after. This major event should be a precast to other development programs that could then benefit the continent.



What would happen with these stadiums?

Football, to a certain extent, in South Africa is like a religion, like it is in Spain, there is a big following crowd. The majority of South Africans happen to be black, and the only sport they were exposed to during the apartheid was football, for that reason most of the country supports this sport and whenever there are teams playing the stadiums get full.

We have national leagues, and, for almost all the stadiums that we have built, there are teams coming from those areas which are playing in a premium league, so those stadiums will continue to be used.

South Africa is also a country where music is much appreciated and often mega concerts are organized. I believe that these stadiums will become perfect venues for this kind of events.



The 1995 Rugby World Cup that South Africa won against New Zealand was an opportunity that Mandela used to unite the white and black community. Now 15 years later the story plays again. What can we expect from this World Cup? 

I am not sure that I agree that Rugby is a white sport. Because of the apartheid the black population did not have the opportunity to practice this sport and that is why football is seen as being just a black sport, but there are both white and black people playing in both, the rugby and football leagues, and we do strongly believe that any major sport event in South Africa has the ability to bring people together.

I’m sure that many South Africans will be seating side by side irrespectively of race, color, gender, or creed, supporting either the South African team or watching any other teams playing.



It seems tickets are not selling as well as expected. Why is that?

A5/ We are facing a few challenges, one of them is that there are not enough flights from Europe and therefore there are people who wanted to buy tickets but they can’t get seats to fly to South Africa. That’s the reason why we are negotiating to try to increase the frequency of flights to South Africa during the World Cup 2010.

Another reason is the pricing of the tickets. Indeed, many South Africans cannot afford buying tickets. To that effect therefore, FIFA has -together with the local organizing committee- reviewed some of the ticket prices to make sure that more people can afford buying them.

Another problem we found is that often tickets are sold online and not every South African has access to the internet, that’s why FIFA together with the local organizing committee has decided that they are going to have stations where people can go physically and buy the tickets.



Tourism is one of the main sectors in South Africa (around 5,5 million tourists visited SA in 2008) and for this year around 10 million tourist are expected because of the World Cup. You organized a very important in-stock promotion at El Corte Inglés in Spain and Portugal with South African products for a month. South Africa will also have a national pavilion at the Alimentaria International Food and Beverages Exhibition in Barcelona in March 2010 to showcase South African products. However the truth is that still very few Spaniard visit South Africa. How do you think you could promote South Africa as destination in Spain?

We will continue working as we have been doing so far, working closely with the tour operators, I personally believe that the key to attract more tourism is not only about what we can say but what the tour operators says. For us it is then very important to work very closely with them so that they can offer competitive packages.
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We also invite the media to all the events and activities that we are organizing because they shape the perception of any society in the world, so if the media send positive feedbacks, people will become curious and they will want to know about us.

We are also trying to engage Iberia to bring down the ticket prices so that people can afford to go, because as long as the price to go to South Africa is as high as it is nowadays people will not go and unfortunately we only have one direct route from Spain to South Africa monopolized by Iberia, there is no other airline that does a direct flight from Spain to South Africa.



Madrid will host next July 18th the “Nelson Mandela Day 2010”. It will also be the day he will turn 92 years old. Many activities are going to be organized in the next months. Could you tell us more about the main points of the program?

That is part of the “46664 Campaign”, I am sure that you know that 466 means Nelson Mandela was the four hundred and sixty-sixth prisoner to be taken to Robben Island and 64 stands for the year when he was imprisoned (1964).

We went to the United Nations and requested the recognition of Mandela’s birthday worldwide by the UN as a day for everybody in the world to take 67 minutes of their time to do something to help other persons. We have received a resounding support from persons such as Mr. Gordon Brown, Mr. Obama and many others personalities who support that cause. We are organizing a number of activities in Spain including talks in schools, educational programs or marathons in order to raise funds to help the needy and the poor.

We are trying to emulate Nelson Mandela by trying to make sure that more and more is done because all together we can make a difference as Nelson Mandela did.

We are then going to organize a number of activities which will culminate ultimately with a concert. For managing this we are working very closely with the Madrid provincial government as well as the municipality, they are being very supportive with this initiative and some companies in Spain also are very keen to sponsor.



South Africa is in a difficult group with Uruguay France and Mexico. How do you think the Bafana Bafana is going to do during this Football World Cup?

We South Africans have the ability to surprise the world, for instance, when we hosted the Rugby World Cup in 1995 nobody thought that South Africa would make it very far and South Africa came out as winner.

But besides this point, I think that for us in South Africa we already won, the main fact that we are hosting the Football World Cup is a victory on its own, so if we win the World Cup it will be a second triumph but it is not a priority. We already got the prestige of hosting such a global sport event.

The teams you mentioned, Mexico, Uruguay and France are all big teams, but we do sincerely hope that with the local support we will give our best.

Also, one has to remember that this is a very good opportunity for players to market themselves to international teams, so I believe that motivation also will make our players work the extra mile to make sure that they perform well.



What would be your final message?

I think that generally the Spanish community needs to change. For instance when you have a football match between Real Madrid and Barcelona, whether it is in Barcelona or in Madrid, the stadium is full, but when their national team plays the stadiums are not always full and that for me raises a question, Why do people support their teams but not their national team? I think the national team is very important to develop the pride and patriotism, I believe that people in Spain love football, and there is no reason why they can’t be proud when their national team is represented. They did very well during the last European Cup in 2008 winning the championship and I think this is a great opportunity for Spain to win the World Cup 2010, but the team needs the support of the Spanish community, so the more Spanish supporters fly to South Africa, the more the team will feel supported.

I hope that a lot of Spanish people will go to support their team as a sign of patriotism and to show they are proud of being Spaniards, and I also hope that the Spanish national team will not disappoint so that the Spanish community that goes to South Africa can stay longer

Spaniards don’t know South Africa that well and South Africans don’t know Spain that well, so I think this is a very good opportunity. So far, in South Africa everybody knows about Real Madrid and Barcelona but I things there are other things to promote.



We have many African football players in the Spanish football league but only 1 South African. Why do you think is that?

I think Spain historically had a better relationship with Western Africa than with Southern Africa, also a number of tourists from Spain visit West Africa rather than Southern Africa, so naturally in terms of knowing what is happening, it is easier for Spanish football teams to know about West African than South Africa, but we do sincerely hope that that is going to change, I would personally like to see more South African players coming to play in Spain,



You recently met Raúl Gonzalez Blanco in Madrid who used to lead the Spanish national team. Is Spain your second favorite team to win the Football World Cup?

No, South Africa is my first and second favorite team, but I have to say that to me Raul has been a very good ambassador for the football in general, both on and off the field. Raul has never been involved in any scandal and I hope the younger players will follow his example. He has been playing for the Real Madrid for a very long time and he is still as humble and modest as at the beginning of his career.

Today when you talk about Raul people think of the Real Madrid because of the positive impact that he had in the game.

The same can be said of other Spanish players such as Xavi Hernandez, Andrés Iniesta, Iker Casillas or Fernando Torres who give a positive image of Spain wherever they go.

Although I must say that South Africa is my first and second choice, Spain off course is one of the favorite teams to win in the World Cup.