By Gilbert Mercier
[O]n the occasion of the start of World Cup 2014, PRN’s Utrice Leid interviewed News Junkie Post Editor in Chief Gilbert Mercier about the social ramifications of holding these games in Brazil and the corruption generally surrounding the World Cup.
“Like any European, or African, or…, football is something that we deeply care about, but there’s been in the past 30 years some global perversion of the game. The perversion is from money…. The World Cup in Brazil is a big commercial circus. It’s very much like the panem et circenses of Julius Ceasar, but it’s very short on bread and long on circuses. As you were mentioning, $15 billion were spent to build stadiums that might never be used again. Even worse than that, one of them might end up being converted into a prison….
“There’s a scandal that came up…. The president of FIFA, Sepp Blatter: his head might end up falling off during the World Cup. They’re in the middle of huge bribery scandal that has to do with awarding of the Cup to Qatar [for] 2022. Some Qatari who happens to be a… huge contractor was going around with a briefcase full of cash all over Africa, all over the Caribbean, all over the world, giving $200,000 here, $200,000 there, to buy votes to get the cup awarded to Qatar. This just blew up right now in what could be a perfect storm for FIFA.
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