The 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar just took another hit.
During its pitch in 2010 to host soccer’s biggest event, the Middle Eastern country’s royal family boasted about Qataris’ love of sports. They did it again in November to win 2019’s world track and field championships.
But The Associated Press’ John Leicester found that Qatar’s love of all things sports is not exactly genuine.
Leicester learned that the country has been paying migrant workers from Africa and Asia to fill its stadiums and pretend to be sports fans. Workers from Kenya, Ghana, Nepal and elsewhere receive around 30 Qatari riyals — about $8 — for volleyball matches and 20 or 25 for soccer. A Kenyan worker told Leicester he once received 50 riyals for handball.
Understandably, the workers don’t mind being paid to sit and pretend to cheer. There was even free WiFi at November’s Qatar Open for international beach volleyball — which Leicester attended with workers — for the “spectators” to have a chance to email their families and catch up on world news.
But these paid fans actually are turning away the real ones.
“A survey of 1,079 Qatar residents published this January by the Ministry of Development Planning and Statistics suggested that paid fans may be turning Qataris off sport,” Leicester wrote. “The ministry said two-thirds of Qataris surveyed did not attend any football matches during the previous season and two-thirds of respondents cited ‘the spread of paid fans’ as a ‘significant reason’ keeping audiences away.”
Despite Qatar’s extreme heat and reports of corruption to earn their bid, it might still get its World Cup. But unless the country changes its ways by 2022, the stadiums won’t be full of actual Qataris.
Thumbnail photo via Twitter/@MattBonesteel
