The death of football legend Pelé upset millions of football fans. Born Edson Arantes do Nascimento, the Brazilian star has touched hearts and captivated minds around the world. In Africa, he is celebrated not only for his mastery of the ball, but also as a symbol of Black excellence and representation.
For me, Pelé is an indescribable source of inspiration and joy.
I was born into a world devoid of the memorable stories of Black People and their universally praised Black heroes, a planet ravaged by economic power and the violent politics of power. white supremacy.
Whether it’s politics, science, business, or sport, whiteness has permeated every conceivable aspect of society and effectively marginalized Negroes of human existence. system.
White people – we were told – are the best scientists, the best business managers, the best athletes. They are role models to follow and emulate.
But we know this is wrong. And we adore Black superstars like Pelé and Muhammad Ali and Black revolutionaries led the Negro and Negro liberation movements that were spreading across the African continent and North America.
Growing up in what is known as Salisbury, Rhodesia (present-day Harare), a bastion of settled colonialism, I was acutely aware of the “racism” of heroes.
My heroes – freedom fighters – are described as “terrorists”. African nationalists like Joshua Nkomo and Robert Mugabe were imprisoned by the white settlement regime after agitating for democracy, civil rights and equality for all races.
My uncle, Moses, joined the liberation movement as a teenager and underwent military training in Mozambique and Yugoslavia. After he passed away, for many years, we didn’t even know if he was still alive. He only returned after we were finally liberated and Rhodesia became Zimbabwe in 1980.
Black people in sports that I admire are also denigrated and insulted. Pelé had a string of derogatory nicknames that he was called, while Muhammad Ali was once considered “a disgrace to his country” and a “fool”.
So my heroes aren’t celebrated in the wide and well-developed parts of Salisbury, where mostly rich and privileged whites live, or for that matter, in those affluent and privileged whites. poor and densely populated Black community.
For fear of reprisal by government soldiers, sympathizers and spies, people talked about their unsung heroes at home and mostly in silence. Rhodesian security forces regularly kill Blacks for allegedly collaborating with freedom fighters or violating nighttime curfews.
Elsewhere, the Sharpeville massacre in South Africa and the violent crackdown on 1967 Uprising in America Detroit also shows how the white world brutally resisted Black struggles for socioeconomic equality and political independence.
In the midst of this violence and fear, Black superstars like Pelé give us a glimmer of hope. They defy the condescending stereotypes and stifling challenges that white supremacists pose to us – to Blacks everywhere.
Granted, Pelé wasn’t the first Black athlete to achieve massive success in a sport or global competition, he was the first Black to reach the pinnacle of football, the sport where the majority of the poor in Africa and the African diaspora love every bit.
My hometown, a vast high-density suburb called Kambuzuma, is still far from the feats of outstanding Black athletes such as American basketball star Bill Russell, champion NBA 11 times champion.
When I was younger, I didn’t know baseball legend Jackie Robinson or tennis star Althea Gibson, the first African-American woman to play tennis professionally and win a Grand Slam title.
I love Pelé, in part because football, unlike tennis, basketball and baseball, is an extremely accessible sport.
Armed with a “chikweshe,” a homemade plastic ball, my friends and I often play on bumpy makeshift pitches demarcated with sticks and stones.
However, my admiration for Pelé is not only about football.
Long before I was old enough to appreciate his countless achievements and confidently place him at the forefront of football’s all-time greats, the Brazilian soccer star mounted inextricably linked with Africa’s socio-political and cultural awakening. Next to Muhammad Ali, he exists as a sublime and indelible symbol of Black pride.
Pelé’s story helped inspire a cult of Black identity at a pivotal time in the history of Africa and my country. For a people so traumatized by oppression and economic deprivation, his unparalleled success has set us free to enjoy endless possibilities for our future.
After that, pundits and fans alike will constantly debate whether he’s the the greatest player in history, before the Argentinian conductor Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi – or Cristiano Ronaldo of Portugal.
Others will question whether he actually scored more than 1000 goals, breaking into the Guinness World Records.
Johan Cruyff, a three-time Dutch star who won the prestigious Ballon d’Or football award, would disagree with such superfluous arguments about my hero.
“Pelé is the only football player who transcends the boundaries of logic,” he said.
I believe that one day, someone can surpass Pelé’s achievements. But no footballer can claim to have embodied the hopes and dreams of Africans during the colonial era – the long, hard and bloody years when we desperately wanted to see and appreciate the supreme expression of Black identity.
Today, first and foremost, Pelé must be remembered as an extraordinary man, a Black man who exceeded all expectations in a world shaped and ravaged by legacies of slavery and white supremacy. of white people.
He may be gone, but the spirit of Black excellence he embodied will live on forever.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect the editorial stance of Al Jazeera.
