Want to start a debate among South Africans? Get several of them together and ask what positive developments are likely to spring from the country's preparations to host the 2010 World Cup? Inevitably you’ll get someone passionately telling you that it is nothing more than an ill-fated jingoistic boondoggle while someone else argues as ardently that the World Cup will propel South Africa into the first rank of nations, and you’ll hear all opinions between these two poles.
It does appear that preparations for the World Cup have forced South Africa to upgrade significantly an antiquated transportation infrastructure that, in the words of this Mail & Guardian story, is “still plodding on routes designed by the apartheid regime to keep people apart.” According to Transport Minister Jeff Radebe, “The development of our transport infrastructure will undoubtedly be one of the shining legacies of the World Cup.” It remains to be seen if the real outcome achieves the idealized one, but at least the desires of those involved in the planning represent a long-range vision for South Africa.
