Sport struggles to escape the world of Terrorism

by Chris Pita

The Africa Cup of Nations was meant to be Angola’s big sporting moment, but after much anticipation disaster struck before a ball had even been kicked.

On January 8 three members of the Togolese football team’s entourage were killed as their team bus came under fire en route to Togo’s base in the disputed Angolan region of Cabinda.

Everyone can relate to sport even without actively playing any. There have been times when we have all enjoyed playing or watching sport.

To an extent sport is more universal than art. It’s not something that is solely associated with liberals or artisans, sport transcends age, gender, race and nationality.

So when events unfold such as the attack on the Togolese football team, it is always difficult to accept that sport does not evade these tragedies.

Three families have lost their loved ones and another is still waiting for theirs as they remain in intensive care.

They are within reason to blame the Angolan authorities. Essentially, it is the host country not FIFA that is responsible for the protection of athletes and fans going to and from sporting events.

Reuters News agency reported that those responsible for the incident, FLEC (Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda) have been waging a 30 year resistance against the Angolan government.

The region in question, Cabinda, is separated from Angola by the border of the DRC (Democratic Republic of the Congo) but was occupied by the MPLA (Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola) 30 years ago.

Oil disputes

Unfortunately, this incident is not as straight forward as some conflicts between some tribal regions in Africa. The conflict in this region is driven instead by resources such as oil.

Almost two million barrels of oil are produced in the region the size of Yorkshire every day. This accounts for one third of Angola’s oil production.

Therefore it is not surprising that the UK and the US have invested heavily in the region. Companies like Chevron Texaco have been in Angola since 1958 exploring and using offshore facilities to extract oil.

As well as oil there are significant gold deposits to attract foreign companies. Not that the situation couldn’t be made more volatile, Lara Pawson, a Guardian correspondent, brings to light that the former Leader of FLEC, Antonio Bento Bembe, had been released from a Dutch jail after what appears to have been some sort of deal with Angolan authorities and was then appointed leader of human rights in Cabinda by the Angolan government.

Human rights

The reality is that human rights offences remain rife and in a recent report issued by Human Rights Watch, it was stated that there were 38 arrests made by Angolan security forces against individuals who were accused of crimes against the security of the state.

Pawson suggests that this incident itself could have been orchestrated by the ruling government led by Jose Eduardo Dos Santos (the African Colonial freedom fighter turned leader).

Pawson argues that orchestrating an erratic attack on a team with a high profile player such as Emmanuel Adebayor, will gain sympathy from Western countries.

This would give the Angolan government the backing required to destroy any FLEC resistance and finally make on-shore oil operations secure, which only began in 2002 after the end of a 27 year civil war in Angola.

- Past terrorism in sports

The attack on the Togo national team is the latest in a long line of incidents involving terrorists during sporting events. Many of these have dwarfed Angola in terms of casualties and violence.

Münich 1972

The most infamous of sporting terrorist attacks was at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games. Eight Arab terrorists from the Palestinian militant group Black September took the Israeli national team hostage, eventually murdering 11 athletes and coaches and one German police officer after a 16-hour standoff.

Atlanta 1996

Over 20 years later, another Olympic games was marred, this time by a home made bomb at Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic-Park - the designated ‘town square’ of the Games.

The villain Eric Rudolph - a former explosives expert for the United States army - sought retribution over the Bill Clinton government. Rudolph believed that “the conception and purpose of the so-called Olympic movement is to promote the values of global socialism” and he hoped to “confound, anger and embarrass the Washington government in the eyes of the world for its abominable sanctioning of abortion on demand.”

Aintree 1997

The world-famous Grand National fell victim to terrorists in 1997. Two coded bomb threats were reportedly received from the IRA causing the abandonment of the race and evacuation of a capacity 60,000 plus crowd.

Terrorism didn’t win though, as two days later everyone came back and the race was eventually run.

Madrid 2002

The beautiful game turned ugly in 2002 when Madrid’s Bernabau Stadium was the target for an attack by the Basque separatists ETA.

Thankfully, no one was injured when a car bomb detonated close to the stadium hours before the start of Real Madrid’s Champions League semi-final against arch rivals Barcelona.

Lahore 2009

In March last year a group of a dozen men attacked the Sri Lankan cricket team’s coach and police escort en route to their cricket match against Pakistan.

Using rocket grenades and multiple rounds of ammo, six policemen were killed as well as one of the drivers of the coach.

Furthermore seven members of Sri Lanka’s team were injured in the attack - conducted by Islamist militants from Pakistan. Ironically the Sri Lankans were only playing in Pakistan after Australia refused to enter the country for safety reasons.