Angola, 31 January 2010, 9.38 pm: “Gido, to Zidan, back to Gido with a neat flick, he’s through on goal….Gido does it again!” Egypt crowned the champions of Africa in 2010 for the third time in a row, defeating Ghana in the final 1-0. I sat in the KFC in Zamalak watching the big screen, a sea of red replica Egyptian football t-shirts celebrating wildly in the streets, beep, beep, beep of cars, everyone hugging and cheering in victory, the Nile waiting, silent.
Almost a year to the day later, revolution would break out. The streets were filled again but with chants for freedom, shouts of hope, screams of desperation…
Almost a year to the day later after that, 74 Ahly fans, the Ultra Ahlawies, would be massacred at Port Said stadium. The same Ultras who stood fist to fist, scream to scream, with Egyptian security forces on Mohamed Mahmoud street in November 2011. Mohamed Salah, Egypt’s current football darling, wears the number 74 at the back of his shirt for his Italian club, Fiorentina. The same security forces who were at Port Said, watching, waiting…revenge.
Football suspended. The league over. No ‘Pharaohs’, the reigning three time champions, in the African Nations Cup 2012 to defend their title.
Cairo, 8 February 2015, 8.40pm: Almost two years to that day, 30 Zamalek White Knights, the bitter rivals of the Ultra Ahlawies, perished at the Air Defense Stadium in Cairo, where their souls breathed their breath, where they received no defense or mercy from the security forces. No ‘Pharoahs’ in the African Nations Cup 2014, and after last night, the league has been suspended again. Again. Ghana lost the final last night by a single goal. Again. Death. Again. “Enta Ahlawy walla Zamal….never mind”….
The bloodied shirts of Zamalak fans, their famous white tops scattered outside the stadium.
Revolutionaries like Douma getting a life sentence the same week as Ahmed Ezz, the personification of crony capitalism and corruption under Mubarak, states his intention to run for Parliament next month, the ‘voice’ of the people. Voiceless. Numb. The game carried on last night despite the dead bodies. Numb to it all.
Greste arrives in Australia a free man. Good. His two colleagues, Egyptians, still rot in jail. Greste’s freedom tells us that Fahmy and Baher are guilty of only being Egyptian. Nationalism. What nationalism? Our football heroes made the people happy. Abo Treika, Ahmed Hassan, El Hadary, I miss El Hadary, Egypt was safe in his hands, Zidan, Gido…his goal feels a lifetime ago. For those that have perished since, it is.
Football. A sport. No, a lifeblood of Egypt, a source of solitary joy, and pride, amidst the humiliation, the defeat, hope and promises shattered, waiting to finally break. How long can we hold out? How many bodies are needed? “At least we’re not like Syria” HE tells us. Yes, he. An insult to both nations, to both peoples.
Congratulations to Ivory Coast on victory last night. In a parallel universe, at exactly the time you lifted the trophy, your once close rivals were calling parents telling them which morgue to go to.
Ahmed Kadry 