Argentina, which won the World Cup, arrived in Buenos Aires on December 20, followed by a celebration parade. At a time of national celebration, Argentine President Alberto Fernandez is depressed. According to several Argentine media reports, President Fern á ndez’s attempt to meet the players at the Rose Palace of the presidential residence was rejected on the grounds that “he does not want the team’s achievements to have anything to do with politics. I don’t want the winning of the World Cup to be used politically.”
The decision was made on behalf of the team by Claudio Tapia, president of the Argentine Football Association. In an interview with Argentine newspaper El Nacional, Tapia said: “the victory and honor of winning the World Cup belongs to the Argentine people, not to a certain Argentine government.”
Picture Tapia, president of the Argentine Football Association
Picture of Argentine President Fernandez
Nothing like this has ever happened in history. In the past, governments used to entertain World Cup winners with the highest standards. Argentina has won two World Cups before. When he won the title in 1978, Argentine dictator Videla awarded the World Cup to Argentina captain Passarella; by the time he won the title again eight years later, Argentina’s president had become the democratically elected Raul Alfonsin. He took the World Cup from Maradona at that time.
Picture Alfonsin (left)
Compared with them, Fernandez is obviously the most unlucky, he is the first president in the world to be rejected by the championship team.
Why did Tapia and the players reject Fernandez? There is a lot of speculation on the Chinese Internet. At present, the most widespread saying is that players do not like President Fernandez because Fernandez is not in power in Argentina as president, and Fernandez introduced strict prevention and control measures at the beginning of COVID-19 ‘s epidemic in 2020. Players and their families can not meet, so the players hate Fernandez.
There is also a saying that the players are standing up for Lionel Messi. In 2020, Messi collected a batch of ventilators through personal channels and tried to donate them to his hometown of Rosario. However, the ventilators were detained at the airport for several months by Argentine customs on the grounds that “customs clearance documents were not complete”, which led Messi to fire at the Argentine government many times in public.
These speculations seem reasonable, but they are not the reason why Argentina rejected Fern á ndez this time. Because in fact, a similar plot had already been staged as early as 2021, when President Fernandez invited Argentina after they won the Copa America, but the soldiers rejected Fernandez for the above reasons at that time.
If Fernandez was rejected twice for the same reason, the Argentine players would have held a grudge. In fact, this time the Argentine Football Association has seriously considered accepting Fernandez’s invitation to visit the Rose Palace. However, the attitude of the players changed 180 degrees as a result of a failed parade.
After Argentina won the championship, the Argentine government declared a national holiday. Fernandez’s intention was to allow Argentines to fully participate in the celebrations, feel the joy of winning the World Cup and boost their approval ratings. But after the decision was made, other officials of the Argentine government were alarmed, because although the possibility of Argentina winning the championship could be foreseen throughout the country, the government had no previous guidance plan for the celebrations. there is no time to make contingency plans for possible emergencies.
The Argentine Football Association is not well prepared. Tapia’s idea is very simple. He just wants the players to take an open bus through the main road of Buenos Aires on July 9, and finally arrive at the May Square. Let the players interact with the fans at the obelisk in the middle of the square.
But this plan is not a strict plan, in fact, it is carried out quite casually. At the request of the athletes themselves (such as requiring the convertible bus to pass in front of the neighborhood where they live), the route changes again and again during the driving process, and the fans are not satisfied with waiting for the bus to pass by in a fixed place. more and more fans began to follow the bus, and some fans even jumped off the bridge as the bus passed by, scaring the players into a cold sweat.
Not only that, the complex road conditions on the streets of Buenos Aires have also been ignored. In some neighborhoods, telephone poles were so low that when the bus reached an intersection, Messi, Paredes and other five players sitting high nearly hit the cable, and Paredes’s hats were knocked off. The fans under the car snatched Paredes’s hat and nearly caused a riot.
The bus parade lasted five hours, and more and more fans surrounded the bus, which made the team’s speed extremely slow. At the same time, Argentina’s Ministry of National Security has detected that nearly 5 million Argentine fans have gathered on both sides of the road on July 9 and on the May Square. The road of July 9, which was 148m wide, is now packed and poses huge security risks. So Argentine National Security Minister Anibal ordered that buses be banned from going to the May Square and the players were allowed to continue cruising by helicopter instead.
The flooded May Square of Buenos Aires
We are lucky that there is no stampede at the scene.
There are people everywhere.
The Argentine players arrived in Buenos Aires at 2am local time. Since then, a large number of fans have been waiting in May Square, but they have not been able to get close to the players. It was not until 4pm that the players flew over the May Square by helicopter, circled over the heads of the fans several times and then left. After waiting for 14 hours, the fans were disappointed, and some fans clashed with the police. according to the statistics afterwards, a total of 8 people were injured and 13 were arrested.
After being asked by Anibal to parade by helicopter, Tapia communicated the decision to the fans through social media and apologized to the fans. After the helicopter parade, the players posted photos of sitting on the helicopter on social media and expressed regret that they could not get in close contact with the fans. Most fans expressed their understanding of the decision, but some fans still lashed out at the players and the Argentine Football Association.
You can barely see a Dibala by the window.
Looking back on the parade, the Argentine Football Association and Argentine players took all the blame for the security services, so it was natural to take it out on the president, and it was not surprising that Fernandez was rejected again.
However, to the surprise of many people, although the parade is over, the war of words between the Argentine Football Association and the Argentine government has only just begun. Argentine media revealed on Wednesday that Tapia and Anibal quarreled several times during the parade. Tapia accused Anibal of breaking Argentina’s tradition of cruising by open buses, while Anibal accused the Argentine Football Association of being unplanned and purely improvising.
Anibal said: “has the Argentine Football Association thought about how many people will take part in the parade?” No, they may think there are only tens of thousands of people. When 500000 people appeared on the streets, they began to panic, but the end result was that 5 million people poured into the streets of Buenos Aires. That area is full of rivers and bridges, as well as the offices of government departments such as the courts. ”
Tapia’s response to Anibal’s accusation was short and angry: “you screwed up the celebration (Me CAG á s los festejos)!”
The incident appears to be a conflict between Tapia and Anibal, but in fact it is a feud between Argentine President Fernandez and the Argentine Football Association. Shortly after becoming president of Argentina, Fernandez repeatedly challenged the Argentine Football Association, demanding that the Argentine Football Association be “updated and modernized.” Fernandez’s aim is to oust Tapia because Tapia is not his own. However, Tapia is one of the few people in the Argentine Football Association who has been able to understand things since Grondona, so Fernandez’s efforts were ultimately in vain.
Tapia can be said to be trusted by Messi.
The Argentine media described Argentina like this: “if we see five pieces of news about Argentina in the international community, then four of them must be bad news.” respectively, debt default, COVID-19 death toll reached a record high, the president’s slip of the tongue and the inflation rate reached 100%. The only good news is that Messi scored a goal. ” In this political environment, it is not difficult to understand how Fernandez wants to use football to stand on his own platform.
Argentina refused to go to the Rose Palace, putting Messi at the forefront of public opinion once again. But in fact, Messi kept a polite and safe distance from every Argentine president. In February 2021, Messi lent his private jet to Fernandez because Argentina owed so much that if Fernandez left the country on a government chartered flight, the plane could easily be withheld by creditors to pay the debt.
Fernandez’s predecessor, Macri, said many times in the past that “Messi is his good friend.” During the World Cup, former Argentine President Marco Macri said bluntly: “if Messi can lead Argentina to the World Cup, then we should elect him president.” Messi only smiled at Macri’s remarks. Because anyone with a discerning eye can see that Macri is taking advantage of Lionel Messi to attack his political rival Fernandez. Messi has never been involved in politics, but Argentine politicians have been touching Lionel Messi.
Former President Macri
In fact, many politicians are playing on Fernandez’s and Macri’s little plans. For example, although the French team won the runner-up, but Macron still received the French team. Before that, he also watched the final between Argentina and France. By contrast, Fern á ndez did not go to Qatar, but watched the match at home. I don’t know if it’s because I’m afraid of being unpopular, or because I don’t have any money.
After the final, Macron made an ebullient speech in the French locker room and asked aides to post a video of his speech online, but Macron was ridiculed by some people and politicians. Because during the World Cup, the United States introduced the “inflation reduction Act”, which had a great negative impact on the European economy, Macron said he would respond to this; in addition, Macron also made a promise to the French nationals. said it would play a greater role in mediating the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. French media commented that Macron’s high-profile attention to the World Cup was nothing more than a cover-up that he had not played any role in the other two things.
In the more than 200 years since the founding of the people’s Republic of Argentina, Argentines have hardly liked their president. But this time Argentina’s rebuttal of the president’s face is also a precedent in the history of football. I don’t know if Fernandez envied dictator Videla when he was rejected, because Videla was unpopular, but at least no one dared to reject Videla-because Videla really dared to shoot.
Former President Videla (second from right), sentenced to life imprisonment for crimes against humanity in 1985, died in prison in 2013
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