THERE is a general tendency whenever hooligans go on the rampage at football matches to blame the police rather than the troublemakers. Sometime they are blamed for using excessive violence, while other times they are accused of not intervening promptly enough to stop the fighting. Whatever they do, they cannot win, because the clubs put the blame, either on the police or on the referee, rather than their fans when there is crowd trouble at a match.
It is a blinkered approach, which perpetuates football hooliganism by absolving the troublemakers of any responsibility for their acts. A hooligan may have smashed someone’s car or pelted rival fans with rocks, but the club will maintain it’s not really his fault because the police presence was low. We have also heard clubs accusing police of provoking the violence by using excessive force. This ambiguous attitude by the clubs towards violence is a primary cause for the worsening of the hooligan problem.
If hooliganism is ever to be tackled, all the clubs should speak with one voice on violence, without ambiguity or qualification. Violence and hooliganism need to be condemned, unequivocally, by clubs, supporters’ associations and the football authorities, at all times. And the police should be supported in their efforts to tackle the problem, instead of getting a worse press than the troublemakers.
But the police also need to get their act right if they are to earn the support and confidence of the public. The ineptitude and lack of professionalism displayed by the police at GSP stadium on Saturday night was unlikely to win anyone over. And the arrogance with which the Minister of Justice and the police command subsequently defended the catalogue of errors committed by officers at the ground is unlikely to win much sympathy.
A police officer used force to arrest the Apollonas trainer from his team’s bench because he had, allegedly, been behaving provocatively. What had he done – he spoke rudely to an officer. The sensible thing for the officer to do would have been to have charged him after the match rather than arrest him while the match was in progress. The arrest, which involved a scuffle in front of some 20,000 fans, was more of a provocation than anything the trainer had said. It provoked some players, who came to the defence of their trainer at half-time and also became involved in the scuffles.
The DISY leader, Nicos Anastassiades, who was at the match, went to dressing room as a peacemaker and asked the police to release the trainer and a player they had arrested. This provoked the rebuke of the minister of justice, Doros Theodorou, who has ordered an investigation and suspended the policeman who had followed Anastassiades’ orders. The DISY leader may have had no business interfering, yet without his intervention the situation may have become much worse. At least common sense prevailed.
Rather than criticise Anastassiades, Theodorou should be looking at how the police lost control and behaved in such a totally unprofessional and shabby way, picking a fight with a trainer and players during a match. This was indefensible behaviour, which completely shatters public confidence in the police and, ultimately, undermines the drive to eliminate hooliganism.
