There’s a naive fallacy at the heart of the Welsh Government’s approach to the World Cup in Qatar. It’s the belief that proclaiming the values of inclusivity and diversity - in particular supporting LGBT rights - is going to persuade the Qataris to change their stance on homosexuality and other issues.
The stark fact is that it won’t.
So opposed is the Qatari regime to accepting LGBT rights that it won’t even permit the display of armbands or bucket hats that carry the rainbow pattern. And when it came to the crunch, national teams decided their players would not wear such armbands after all when warned they would get yellow cards if they did.
Equally, the bucket hats were confiscated because in Qatar they are deemed to be offensive and unacceptable. It seemed from their reaction that those who had their bucket hats taken from them were surprised, as were their friends.
One Wales supporter said: “I am angry that what should’ve been the highest point of my football following life has been sullied. Last night’s confiscation of rainbow bucket hats is a new low even for this World Cup.”
Distressing as being parted from one’s bucket hat may be, it’s fair to say that the degree of suffering is infinitesimally small in comparison with that endured by persecuted gay Qataris or many of the country’s migrant workers from poor countries.
A gay Qatari now living in exile in the United States told the Guardian: “What is it like to be an LGBT Qatari? You live in fear, you live in the shadows, you’re actively persecuted. You’re subjected to state-sponsored physical and mental abuse. It’s dangerous to be an LGBT person in Qatar.”
A Fifa World Cup Ambassador from Qatar described homosexuality as “damage in the mind”. Another Qatari described views of this kind as part of their culture, saying “You have your culture and we have ours”, as if there was a moral equivalence.
Such opinions are entrenched and uttered with religious authority. Last week the German TV channel Arte released a documentary about migrant workers living in squalid conditions and being treated like serfs, working long hours with hardly any time off.
Despite improvements on paper in labour laws, migrant workers claim there has been little change in practice. A supermarket worker from Kenya told how he had paid a recruitment fee of $1,500 to get him a job, but that he wasn’t paid any of the 400 euros a month he had been promised for working nearly 13 hours per day.
When he and his colleagues went on strike they were threatened with deportation. A group of women working in beauty parlours said they were used to working 11 and a half hour days and had been given only one day off in three years.
Such practices are a far cry from the Welsh Government’s social partnership ideal under which employers, trade unions and government work together to create national prosperity.
While the Welsh Government has been vocal on the issue of LGBT rights, it has said less about workers’ rights.
Nevertheless, following a visit to Qatar in May, Economy Minister Vaughan Gething set out how he hoped to move the human rights agenda forward. He issued a statement which said: “We believe in engaging with countries that do not always share our values on human rights, LGBTQ+ rights, workers’ rights and political and religious freedom. Engaging with countries is an opportunity to develop a platform for further discussion, to raise awareness and to potentially influence a change in approach.
“Trade missions and overseas visits provide such a platform to discuss our values as part of our wider work around developing international relations, our work on economic development and our ambitions as a globally responsible nation. Through this engagement we seek to engage constructively and set out Wales’ approach and how we can work together.”
Mr Gething added: “This visit provided an opportunity to discuss our values with Qatari organisations and I had an opportunity to raise human rights in the context of the World Cup. I expressed the need for all fans to feel welcome at this globally important event which has the potential to shine a light on critical human rights issues.”
Of course Vaughan Gething was right to raise concerns about human rights issues in Qatar. But it’s difficult to believe that he did so with any expectation that his words might result in a change of attitude on the part of the regime.
Tyrants do not back down except when they see no alternative to doing so. The racist apartheid regime in South Africa was brought down by a combination of economic sanctions, military action undertaken by the armed wing of the African National Congress and the sporting boycott that developed after the digging-up of rugby and cricket pitches by activists led by Peter Hain, who went on to be the Labour MP for Neath and a UK Cabinet Minister.
No one has attempted to dig up football pitches in Qatar and they would be met with a brutal response if they did.
We do not have the ability to hurt Qatar economically. In fact, Qatar is a leading supplier to the UK of liquified natural gas (LNG), which comes ashore at Milford Haven. With an obvious reluctance to buy Russian energy following the invasion of Ukraine, imported LNG from Qatar will add to the UK’s energy mix. It’s unlikely there will be any protests about that from the Welsh Government.
Fifa needs to be purged of the kind of corruption that resulted in Qatar being awarded the World Cup in the first place. What’s needed is for those countries that respect human rights to ensure that future tournaments are awarded only to countries that uphold such values.
Getting to the World Cup for the first time in 64 years is a great achievement for the Wales team. But to suggest, as the FAW and others have done, that it somehow defines Wales as a nation simply isn’t true.
There are those who now appear to regard success on the football field as confirmation that Wales is heading for independence. While there are undoubtedly health benefits to be derived from playing football, the idea that playing or watching it leads inevitably to political change is off-beam.
People from across the political spectrum enjoy football, and doing so signifies no allegiance in itself other, perhaps, than support for a particular team.
When the World Cup is over, and the last unconfiscated armbands and bucket hats have been put away in a drawer, the state of LGBT and workers’ rights in Qatar will still be dire. It will take a lot of politics, not well-intentioned gestures, to change that.
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