Sport has the power to unite people from different backgrounds, classes, ages and countries.
Due to this factor, sports is also being increasingly used to distract the world from various corrupt practices and human rights violations.
The opportunistic appropriation of the positivity sports is now a norm, so much so that a new term was coined for this trend.
Last year Oxford dictionaries included the word “sportswashing” into its ever growing list. The term was first used by the Sports or Rights Campaign in 2015, in it’s effort to call out Azerbaijan’s attempt to gloss over human rights violations by stepping up to host major international sporting events.
Critics of Vladimir Putin cite how the Russia World Cup last year, easily managed to steer away the various human rights issues and international conflicts away from media scrutiny.
Qatar hosts the World Cup in 2022 and despite similar issues including human right violations and allegations of atrocious working conditions where numerous stadium construction workers have died. While the issues gets some, but never enough, attention, it would all likely be forgotten as soon as the World Cup starts.
Similarly there are also concerns with the sudden growing interest in sports by Saudi Arabia. This comes in the wake of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, the USA based Washington Post columnist and Saudi critic, at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.
While the Saudi’s are said to have been actively engaging major sports organisations since 2016, the effort to bring high profile events to the kingdom has intensified lately.
Just a day after the murder of Khashoggi broke, a tennis spectacular involving Rafael Nadal and Novan Djokovic in Saudi Arabia was announced for later in the year. While the players confirmed the event was planned much earlier, the timing did not endear to the critics.
British boxer Anthony Joshua is under criticism for agreeing to stage his rematch with Andy Ruiz Jr in the Kingdom in December for a purse said be in excess of £40m.
Amnesty International has criticized the decision as their study shows human right violations in Saudi Arabia has worsened while Joshua had deflected the criticism by claiming one man cannot change the situation.
Come February Saudi would be hosting the Saudi Cup, the richest ever horse racing event offering USD 27 million in prize money. For a nation that balked on women driver until recently, they are even open to the idea of female jockeys at the competition.
Front Line Defenders, founded in Dublin in 2001 with the specific aim of protecting human rights defenders at risk, are among the organisation concerned with the sportswashing trend that are being increasingly supported by major sporting events and organisations.
Saudi Arabia is actively lobbying organisations including National Basketball Association, World Wrestling Entertainment, Major League Soccer and even the Los Angeles Olympic Committee to look into bringing major events into the Kingdom.
The Dakar Rally, held in South America in recent years, will now be held in Saudi Arabia from next year.
While the term sportswashing was only coined in recent years, the practice is widespread and needs the urgent moral stand from sports organisations.
Campaign groups including Sport and Rights Alliance and led by the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy (Bird) have written to the UCI, cycling’s governing body, protesting at its licensing of the Bahrain-Merida team, and the team’s participation in the Tour de France, due to concerns for human rights.
With Israel’s oppression of Palestine, there were also concerns when the Toronto Raptors suggested a playing trip to Israel for the reigning NBA champions.
The presence of Chechnya’s strongman Ramzan Kadyrov in the front row of the UFC’s first show in Moscow last year was also highlighted as a troubling link between the dictator and the MMA.
The Guardian (UK) recently outlined how football clubs are being used for sportswashing through sponsorship and ownership.
They cited the case of Nasser al-Khelaifi, who is the newest member of the UEFA executive committee.
Khelaifi is also chairman of BeIn sports, which pays UEFA for its Champions League TV rights. Uefa is investigating claims of financial fair play breaches by PSG. Where he is – do keep up – the club chairman.
An interesting circle that does not augur well for UEFA, especially when justice may not be seen to be done.
In Malaysia, sportswashing is more subtle and is normally used by politicians to beef up their image among the youth.
Whether it is being used by a despot, the corrupt or just another politician looking to spruce up his image, sportswashing is a dirty business.
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