Winning the World Cup here at home
The world’s most prestigious sporting event, the World Cup, has opened in Brazil, and Ghana our beloved country is one of the 32 countries participating in the quadrennial fiesta.
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Most countries would give their eye teeth to be in this prestigious position and many have paid unimaginable sums of money to qualify. However, to judge by the mood in the country, you would not believe that our team have made us proud.
I have often wondered what it would take to make Ghanaians show passion for our country. Last year after the Black Stars beat the Pharaohs of Egypt by that astonishing goal tally of six goals to one, I posed a question on Facebook which I repeated in this column: Where is our passion for Ghana?
On that occasion, despite that momentous win which guaranteed our qualifying for the World Cup, the streets were deserted and only a few Ghana replica shirts or other kinds of paraphernalia were on display. Nothing has changed much; we still have more taxis showing the Israeli flag than the Ghanaian one, even in a World Cup year.
In 2006, I was so astonished by the lack of public support for the Black Stars in their maiden World Cup appearance that I wrote a letter to Mr Kwamena Bartels, the Minister of Information at the time, suggesting some state-orchestrated support for the national team and our country’s participation in Germany.
To his credit, Mr Bartels got the Vice-President, the late Alhaji Aliu Mahama, to whip us up, while the minister and his ministry made some moves in that direction.
Of course, once the Black Stars started doing well, the level of support rose and rose again. We can rest assured that no one would need to orchestrate any support if the team does well again as it did in the last two World Cup appearances. But a country that only supports its team conditionally is not only a fair-weather nation but also one that suffers from a loyalty deficit.
It is true that no one can force a nation or individuals to be enthusiastic about anything, and football itself is only a metaphor for what we might feel about our nation.
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The nation has invested heavily in the team’s participation, from the qualification to the finals, and it would be proper to have a strategy to make use of their participation at every stage of the journey. Some nations don’t leave these things to chance.
I am worried that the current lack of public enthusiasm for the Black Stars’ participation reflects badly on how we feel about our nation. This is what I wrote in the previous article: “the Black Stars team do not have a different identity from that of Ghana as a nation, which is why the main symbols of support are the national flag and the national colours in one form or another.
“Therefore, outward displays of support for the Black Stars are in effect a show of support and loyalty to the nation. In those long gone days, when the Black Stars’ every win was shared by the nation even before it happened, success was a national motivation to do well in other areas of sport and other endeavours. We did well in boxing, table tennis, athletics and hockey”.
Even more baffling than the absence of public support for the Black Stars before the start of the tournament is the apparent lack of any understanding of the strategic value of our participation at the national leadership level.
There has been no evidence that the government or even Parliament understands that we could make use of the World Cup to achieve some strategic objectives for our country.
As for us the ordinary supporters, we may or may not show our support, although I think it would be good to do so. But the government is funding the Black Stars and I think they have a duty to make something out of it.
In a country that is so politically divided and in which it would be difficult to find common agreement on even the time of day, missing the opportunity to use the team as a focus of unity borders on a dereliction of duty.
Furthermore, being in the World Cup means we are successful at something important and this message could be used to pump our chests with confidence at a time when good news from elsewhere is in rather short supply.
These things are not left to chance in some countries; they are worked out in advance and executed according to plan. It is called value for money.
In addition to using our participation to achieve some important intangible results, it could also earn us some money. Any opportunity to trumpet the name of our country is good for tourism if we know how to package a good deal.
This is not a failure only of the political leadership but also of the private sector; but the bigger share of the blame must go to the government, which, after all, is paying the bills.
Perhaps we need to find some examples of the kind of strategic use of the World Cup I am talking about. In hosting the World Cup in 2006, Germany decided to use the tournament to rebrand the nation and used a strategy known as Germany Land of Ideas to achieve the purpose. They had a very precise idea of what they wanted at the end of the tournament and these were non-football goals they achieved.
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Similarly, South Africa also had a clear vision of what they wanted from hosting the World Cup. One of those goals was to change the perception of that country as a crime-ridden land.
This would in turn drive tourism while spurring the people on with new self-confidence and a feel good factor. Even when a country is not hosting the World Cup, it is necessary to have a plan of how to benefit from the event.
Unfortunately, we have arrived at the World Cup without any strategy beyond getting the team to play. It is sad that we are not able to take strategic advantage of the opportunities that come our way. Maybe it is not too late.
The tournament has a whole month to run. We could be in for a long run, but that is not the point. We could win the World Cup here at home if we know how.
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