Lebanon's politicians play football match to promote unity

By Malek Muhammad Misbah in Beirut
For Al-Shorfa.com
2010-04-14

[Joe Faddoul/Al-Shorfa] Lebanese politicians played a friendly match to promote unity.

For the first time anyone can remember, Lebanese from across the political spectrum were united during an event. A football match between politicians from the majority and the opposition was organised amid a crush of media and security.

The match was held to mark the 35th anniversary of the start of the Lebanese civil war on April 13th, 1975.

At Camille Chamoun Sports City stadium in Beirut, Prime Minister Saad Hariri, ministers, lawmakers and old football stars competed in a match attended by officials, diplomats and sports figures. Lebanese President Michel Suleiman signed the ball presented by Ali Hussein Abdallah, the minister of youth and sports.

Under the theme "we are one team", politicians played the match that was supervised by referees from the Lebanese football association. The contest was organised by the youth and sports parliamentary committee in co-operation with the sports and youth ministry

The political leaders set aside the colours of their blocs and donned a white or red jersey bearing the Lebanese flag in the middle.

But the match was played without a live audience. Interested viewers had to watch on television screens. Beirut streets were empty when the match kicked off in what looked like a scene during the fast-breaking meal of Ramadan.

"Football fans in Lebanon are actually banned from stadiums because of a political security decision after they went out of control in cheering several times," Sports analyst Wadi Abdelnour told Al-Shorfa. "They had to follow the event on the screen just like they do with the national football league."

"Technically, the red squad led by Prime Minister Hariri played well, included players who attacked and manoeuvred, especially Hariri, Minister Gebran Bassil and MP Sami Gemayel, who scored the two winning goals for their team. The harmony was clear between Hariri and Bassil…"

Abdelnour said that the "knights of the game" tried hard to show a minimum level of fitness, and showed some skills in passing and kicking that, "of course differ from their political skills".

After the match the players said it was organised "to forget what happened during the war", and as Hariri added "so that the black days do not return".

Hariri described the match as taking place between the sons of one homeland, one government and one people. "The ministers and lawmakers represent all Lebanese. When we are one team, we cannot be taken as weak."

The chairman of the parliament's youth and sports committee, Simon Abi Ramia, who proposed the match, said that it was "a message through which we score goals against the useless war, and the violence. We say enough of the black era, we have to restore unity and co-operation".

MP Sami Gemayel said after the match that his penetration of the white team's ground to score a goal "was a sign that the defence strategy of [Hizbullah MP] Hajj Ali Ammar is lousy".

MP Nadim Gemayel, a cousin of Sami, who played for the white team, retorted with "the offensive strategy is obviously better".

MP Ammar accused Sami Gemayel of forgetting that the defence strategy is aimed against the "enemy of all Lebanese".

"Secondly, the red team had Prime Minister Hariri, the head of the national unity government, and we preferred not to let the government lose," he said.

While the match did not enthral sports analysts, it received limited praise from political analysts.

Analyst Abd al-Rahman Iyyas told Al-Shorfa that "the players looked to be in perfect harmony and co-ordination in their search for an impressive win. The idea is that they wanted to look like friends on the field. Despite their deep political differences, they wanted to provide a lesson to the people, so that they will live in harmony with each other in the hope that the civil war that broke out on the day of the match [35 years ago] is not repeated."

But he added, "It would have been better if they had agreed on general political rules regarding the identity of the country and its regional role that remain the same to all parties even if they disagreed about other issues. "

"Without these connecting general rules the civil war will remain a threat. Real football matches will continue to be held without an audience for fear violence will break out in a match and deteriorate into an all-out civil war."

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