The World Cup has not yet started (the first match will take place on Sunday November 20) and yet the controversies are already piling up in front of the golden doors of Qatar, which is organizing it. Indeed, many sacred figures of the round ball have decided to boycott the competition to protest against the policy of the organizing country which, according to them, violates many human rights. In August 2022, former German football star Philipp Lahm, captain of the 2014 world champion team and director of Euro 2024, announced that he would not travel to Qatar with the delegation. “As a fan, I’m not very keen on going there. I prefer to follow the tournament from home. Human rights should play an important role in awarding tournaments“, he had explained.
In France, the legend Éric Cantona did not really seem overexcited by the competition either. “I don’t care about the next World Cup, which is not a real World Cup for me […] It’s only about the money and the way they treated the people who build the stadiums is horrible. And thousands of people died“, he told the DailyMail in January 2022.
But it’s not just football stars who have decided to shun this competition which already smells of sulfur. Le Parisien tells us this Tuesday, November 15 that rock star Rod Stewart would have refused a check for 1 million dollars during the World Cup. “I was offered a lot of money, over a million dollars, to play it 15 months ago.”, explained the singer to the Times. According to him, singing in Qatar “ was not the right thing to do. “A position shared by Dua Lipa, who spoke on this subject from her Instagram account:”I’m not going to do it and I’ve never been in negotiations for it.”.
CT
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