Goanet Digest, Vol 21, Issue 327

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Today's Topics:

   1. It's Time For Africa (O Heraldo, 5/7/26) (V M)
   2. The Enigma (Mumbai Mirror, 9/7/2026) (V M)


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Message: 1
Date: Thu, 9 Jul 2026 13:22:41 +0530
From: V M <[email protected]>
To: V M <[email protected]>
Subject: [Goanet] It's Time For Africa (O Heraldo, 5/7/26)
Message-ID:
	<CAN1wPW6chn9n_=1-9cJcuKGcUBgNjVMu-AMkxfrXjYTKsHDQzw-JsoAwUIsXosN+BqQ9rBEUg@public.gmane.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"

https://www.heraldgoa.in/edit/its-time-for-africa/480748/

The fix is on. As always. But even the corrupt, craven and notoriously
pliant FIFA cannot script everything that happens on the field in the
open glare of the World Cup, so players and teams often find ways to
tell their own wonderful stories.

That infinite edge of possibility gives all sport its power to create
unforgettable moments, which can erupt into paradigm shifts in the
collective global consciousness. That happened at the 1936 Berlin
Olympics, which Hitler and the Nazis explicitly intended to be their
ultimate propaganda tool for asserting supposed ?Aryan? supremacy.
Instead, the heroic African-American track and field star Jesse Owens
put the lie to their bigotry, by dominating the sprints and long jump
and taking home four gold medals. Just now, with huge historic
significance, it seems like something similar is underway on US soil
(although Canada and Mexico are also each hosting 13 World Cup
matches) where President Trump and his viciously anti-Muslim,
anti-Black and anti-immigrant MAGA cohort are seeing their racism and
xenophobia repudiated in real time.

Of course, inequality and unfairness aren?t going anywhere soon
either, as we saw play out especially cruelly (and predictably) with
Iran, the first country to play in the World Cup while being subjected
to bombardment by the host. Their team was already under high duress
by the time they got on to the field, after FIFA caved to US demands
they couldn?t stay even one night after games, but had to fly back to
base camp in Mexico. Even after that, they played with such grit and
grace it took an extremely controversial VAR decision (crooked might
be the more appropriate word) to end their tournament.

?What these young people, these players have done, it should be
written in history because the host country treated us very unfairly,?
said Amir Ghalenoi, the dignified coach, ?despite all of these
problems, we've been able to perform well and the world is proud of
Iranians and our team. I urge FIFA, don't let hosts treat players and
teams the same way in future World Cups." Immediately afterwards,
amply proving the Iranian?s point, the American official in charge of
Homeland Security exulted that ?I?m just glad they?re done, and
they?re not coming back, I was so happy when we were able to pull
their visas and said they could leave U.S. soil, and I might have sung
a song or two, or maybe danced a happy dance.?

If he did, Markwayne Mullins danced alone, because the rest of the us
have been lit up with joy by the beautiful game being played by teams
and players that represent the opposite of the Trumpist world view.
There are immigrants galore at this World Cup, more foreign-born
players than previous editions, almost a quarter of 1248 total. Muslim
excellence (and religious expression) has been ubiquitous, from
Spain?s 18-year-old quicksilver genius Yamine Lamal?s sujood after his
first Cup goal, to the regular grateful prostrations by the Egyptians
while edging Australia out on Friday night. Above all, Africa and
African talent has run rampant throughout, whether representing
diasporic locations around the world or the ?sh**hole countries? the
American president continually derides.

It is no secret that football is inextricably linked to colonialism,
both in terms of the spread of the game as well as the host of players
from colonized backgrounds representing the countries of their former
colonizers. For just one obvious example, the dominant French team at
this Cup ? up to now there is no team that looks capable of beating
them ? has 21 players of African descent out of 26. However, the
really big difference in 2026 has come after FIFA grudgingly opened up
direct slots for Africa to 9 (by contrast Europe gets 16) and after an
additional team qualified, 9 out of those 10 advanced. Everyone can
see the immediate improvement in the quality of play, along with style
and drama aplenty, all good for the Cup, but even better for the
world.

Earlier this week, Gerard Akindes wrote a useful essay about the
globalization of African football on the excellent website
africaisacountry.com. He writes that ?today, the majority of players
on Africa?s most successful national teams?except South Africa and
Egypt?play outside the continent. Increasingly, they are dual
citizens, European-born, raised, and trained in Europe, highlighting
an additional challenge.? But then, ?in a fascinating reversal, the
2010s saw a ?reverse muscle drain.? Second- and third-generation
African immigrants born in France (Riyad Mahrez, Algeria), England
(Victor Moses, Nigeria), or the Netherlands (Hakim Ziyech, Morocco)
began representing their ancestral nations. Morocco?s 2022 World Cup
semifinal run was powered by a team mostly born and trained in
Europe.?

Akindes says ?The story of African football is one of structural
irony. Born in colonial resistance, sharpened through the
anti-apartheid struggle and the fight for World Cup representation,
and matured through World Cup heroics, it has finally achieved global
recognition. Yet that recognition has come at a fundamental price. The
commodity logic of global football has reduced many local leagues to
ghost events and turned millions of African children?s dreams into
speculative assets for agents and academies. The success of Morocco?s
and Senegal?s academies and diaspora proves African talent is world
class, but it also shows that players must leave Africa to make a good
living and become stars. When European-born dual citizens choose to
represent their ancestral nations, they bring joy to Africans
everywhere?a genuine pan-African achievement. But it also exposes a
complex and uncomfortable reality: The continent?s domestic football
infrastructure and governance are decaying even as its exported stars
shine weekly through the world sports media complex.?

His conclusion is important to remember as this World Cup illuminated
by African brilliance heads to its crescendo: ?If the game is to truly
serve the continent, the goal cannot be merely to export talent,
produce a commercial AFCON every two years?soon every four?or win
prestigious matches at the World Cup. The goal must be to build the
local ecosystem: to ensure a child in Kano or Kinshasa can grow up to
be a professional in their own country, earn a dignified wage, play in
a full stadium, and watch their league in prime time. Until then, the
global visibility of African stars will remain just that?a reflection
of individual brilliance extracted from a system that cannot yet
sustain it. World Cup successes bring real continental pride. But can
the achievements of a handful of stars and national teams truly speak
to the lives of 1.5 billion Africans, let alone offer a path forward
for the hundreds of millions of young players polishing their skills
on any open patch of ground they can find??




.


------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Thu, 9 Jul 2026 13:19:20 +0530
From: V M <[email protected]>
To: V M <[email protected]>
Subject: [Goanet] The Enigma (Mumbai Mirror, 9/7/2026)
Message-ID:
	<CAN1wPW55a5vrTxXE+eq=OhB8F0=sTWzS5eUMY3c0TLeA8tC-ew-JsoAwUIsXosN+BqQ9rBEUg@public.gmane.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"

https://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com/others/sunday-read/the-enigma/articleshow/132183558.html

The most famous Indian artist on the global scene was born in Bombay in
1954, and went to Cathedral in Fort before boarding at Doon in Uttarakhand,
but it is the UK where he is regarded amongst its greatest cultural icons.

Sir Anish Mikhail Kapoor C.B.E is even emblazoned in the 2015 special
edition British national passports that celebrate ?Creative United Kingdom?
alongside Shakespeare and the computer pioneer Charles Babbage, but he
often tells interviewers ?if it had been possible not to give my [original]
nationality, I wouldn?t have, but India doesn?t allow dual nationality.?
Nonetheless, he was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 2012 (the year before his
knighthood) to add to other stellar international accolades like the 1990
Premio Duemila, the 1991 Turner Prize, the 2011 Praemium Imperiale, and the
2011 Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. In 2017, he won the million-dollar
Genesis Prize ? the ?Jewish Nobel? ? in recognition of his ?contributions
to humanity and commitment to Jewish values.?

Kapoor?s father Rear Admiral Darshan Chander Kapoor joined the Indian Navy
during World War II, becoming an assistant Hydrographic Surveyor in 1946,
and eventually the Chief Hydrographer to the Indian government. A leading
expert in the technical field of maritime boundary delimitation, he joined
the Directing Committee of the International Hydrographic Bureau in Monaco
after retirement, while Anish and his younger brother Roy went in another
direction altogether, ?making aliyah? to migrate to Israel along with most
of their mother?s family.

Hilda Murad Elias Kapoor was part of Bombay?s thriving Baghdadi Jewish
community (who actually came from different locations in what is now Iraq
and Syria throughout the 19th century), and her own father had been the
cantor at Pune?s iconic ?Laal Deval? gothic red brick Ohel David Synagogue.
Years later, her youngest son Ilan (now a professor at York University in
Canada) told Rebecca Mead of The New Yorker ?we always had the sense that
we were outsiders.? But those feelings of alienation only deepened in
Israel, where Anish and Roy faced systematic racism, and the mercurial
young artist-to-be collapsed into nervous breakdown, which he told Mead
only ended after his ?shamanistic Aunt? commanded her sister to ?go back to
India and get some earth, and put it under Anish?s bed. I could cry,
honestly - my mother, bless her, went to India, got some earth, and put it
under my bed. And, in a way, it?s that ritual material that I have been
working with ever since.?

Mud and guts, disorienting visions, shattering scale, Kapoor has become an
international sensation by destabilising his viewers, and forcing them to
confront their innate humanity, to the extent his monumental new Hayward
Gallery retrospective in London (ongoing until October 18) comes with an
unusual trigger warning to make it clear ?this exhibition contains artworks
suggestive of blood and entrails.?

This is full circle for the 72-year-old, with all his greatest hits arrayed
across the full building where his first major survey exhibition was held
nearly 30 years ago. The official website exults about the inclusion of
?Kapoor?s most iconic series: flawless steel mirror sculptures that warp,
distort and disorient; mysterious objects coated in Vantablack ? the
blackest known substance in the world ? that mystify us with their
extraordinary light-absorbing properties; and seemingly depthless voids
opening within the gallery, drawing us in with a thrilling sense of
vertigo.?

At this point in his extraordinary celebrity ? it is undeniable no other
Indian artist has achieved anything quite like it before ? Kapoor has
stopped resisting identitarian labels connected to his ancestral heritage,
but his vocal anti-establishment politics makes him an exception amongst
his peers (with a few notable exceptions like the great Sudhir Patwardhan).
Earlier this year, for just one example, he called for the Venice Biennale
to boycott the USA for ?abhorrent politics of hate and incessant
warmongering.?

What about India? Little has changed from three years ago, when Kapoor
wrote that ?I see very little that dares to challenge. It seems that
artists are afraid. Self-censorship seems to be the overwhelming attitude.
Artists who do anything risky?which includes painting the nude body?are
unable to show their work because of the highly reactionary force that is
perpetrated by the new mood.?


End of Goanet Digest, Vol 21, Issue 327
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