Tutu: W/Cup will continue healing

Nobel Peace Laureate, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, said it was imperative that South Africa be granted the opportunity of hosting the 2010 football World Cup tournament, saying it would provide the mechanism for continuing the healing process after many years of the apartheid system. Archbishop Tutu was speaking at a state dinner on Thursday night in honour of himself and the internationally acclaimed statesman and former South African President, Nelson Mandela, whose flight arrived too late to allow his participation. Both men are in the Caribbean to attend the Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Football Association (CONCACAF) meeting in Grenada next week as part of the lobbying efforts of South Africa to gain the nod from FIFA to host the competition.

He said that nine years ago when South Africa hosted the World Rugby Cup, it provided a situation that allowed for the entire country to be joined together as single unit. “It did more than anything else could ever have done to weld us together,” he said. “So it is not just that we are greedy for the privilege and honour of hosting the football World Cup, it is that it is crucial in the process of our growing to become a free and rainbow nation. “I suggest all you put in an extra little bit of knee drill, that you pray that we succeed for the sake of the world.

South Africa must succeed as a democratic non racial society for the sake of the world, so that people could say if it could happen in South Africa, it can happen anywhere in the world.” Archbishop Tutu provided much laughter when he said that while he was not providing a bribe, he was in a position to give a “first class ticket to Heaven” for persons who supported the South African bid, although he urged them not to use the ticket right now.” Earlier, Archbishop Tutu, on his third visit to Trinidad and Tobago, thanked the country for its role in ending the apartheid system in South Africa.