Kizua Mwangola: Part 8: Benguela's first game

Sunday, January 10, 2010

Right, not only are we all traumatised with the events of last Friday but we now have to deal with the media coverage of it as well. And lordy, lord is it bipolar or what. On one side we have the dramatic, disaster-intensive coverage coming from the west, making it clear the world is coming to an end — Angola first. On the other side we have a Beijing style, 1980's coverage from the national media that makes it all sound oh so alright and downplays Togolese suffering far too much.

If the authorities were media savvy they would have instantly recognised a neo-liberal sort of moment and played it to their advantage. Shock and awe and all that. How easy it would have been to make the most out of this disaster, using it to unite the national and international communities around the "war on terror" disease — all the while promoting the continuation of the CAN as a duty to all who do not believe in giving in to terror. Someone needs to go to America for a 101 course on modern propaganda.

Anyway, three hours for the game against Mali. Força Palancas!

Sunday, January 10, 2010

There isn't much in common between the Angolans and the English. One exception is an uncanny ability to engineer defeats where no one else would believe them possible. That was most certainly the case against Mali tonight.

Thursday, January 14, 2010

We made it to the stadium! Shahin covered it on her facebook, but here's a teaser. The crowd was much bigger in the end, but it took ages to get in!

From Shahin's Facebook:

African Cup of Nations

Nigeria v Egypt and Mozambique v Benin at the Benguela stadium in Angola. Absolutely fantastic atmosphere even though hosts were not playing!

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