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The city of Medellin, which is one of the most dangerous in the whole world, is still very far away from being a refuge of peace. Nevertheless there are now days when no murders are reported in the news.
Today is a good day. First a team from Medellin’s Manrique neighborhood will come to Comuna 13, where the field is located. At any moment the players should arrive at the edge of the field in their rickety car. This is, of course, assuming they have not gotten lost in the maze of thousands of houses, which are perched on top of the cliff overlooking Medellin. Comuna 13 is seen as one of the most violent communities in South America because it is controlled by murderers, drug dealers and thieves.
Nevertheless Carlos, age 45, remains confident that “soccer is the only thing that matters here.” He points towards the street in front of his wooden hut, where a group of youths were chasing an old oval-shaped ball. “Everyone plays. Soccer is pretty much the only thing which everyone respects.”
At that moment, Wilmar came out from his hut, which he nailed together from waste wood he gathered nearby. Wilmar is in his early 20s and has played for “El Golombiao” for three years. “Many of my friends are dead,” he said. “It is a living hell here.” Guerillas and gangs from all political backgrounds terrorize the neighborhood. If anyone tells the authorities, that person will be targeted. Even just a suspicion is enough to justify an attack. “Once they took us out from a bus. They let me and a few boys run away. We found the others later. They had been burned to death, and they had pulled out their fingernails.”
He had to leave for the field because the opponents from Manrique finally arrived. Their coach, the 30 year old John Jairo, approached Carlos. They are both cut from the same cloth - coming from neighborhoods in which poverty and unemployment are huge problems. They were members of gangs, which extorted protection money. “Every evening we went to the bus station and collected money from the drivers,” John Jairo recalled. “They all paid.”
Today they live different lives and are considered respected people in their neighborhood. They have about the same rank as the mayor. They not only know how to deal with gang leaders, but they also deal with police chiefs and the city administration.
John organizes soccer tournaments with Carlos. Teams from other neighborhoods travel to their field. Soccer is perhaps the easiest and most effective measure to work towards peace in the slums of Medellin. “On the field, you can compare yourself with other guys, without worrying about provoking a reaction from anyone. And someone who can play well will impress the girls,” Carlos explained. “Most people who are just hanging around with nothing to do then come to us in order to do something.”
The huge amount of unemployed is constantly growing. Nowhere are there so many internally displaced people as in Colombia: 1.5 million have fled their villages and gone to the cities because leftist guerillas and rightist paramilitary groups were fighting on their doorstep. Arriving at the Barrios’ soccer field in Medellin, they have come out of the firepan and into the fire. Unemployment and gang wars are an everyday part of life in Comuna 13.
The worst are the young contract killers, the Sicarios. One and a half years ago, they terrorized the people so mercilessly that the government was forced to take back control of the neighborhood in a military operation using helicopters and tanks. Has it become more peaceful since then? “Well,” said both men, “it has become better. But the criminals still make the area unsafe.”
For ten years, the 39 year-old German, Jürgen Griesbeck, has also been making sure that the situation calms down to some extent. Griesbeck, who studied sports and sociology, traveled to Medellin for a research project for the Cologne sports university in 1993. One year later, he was there when Andrés Escobar, a player for the Colombian national team and the club Atlético Nacional de Medellin, was shot in the middle of the street. Apparently he was shot because he scored an own goal in the FIFA soccer world cup in 1994 in the USA. Because of the own goal, Colombia did not go on in the tournament.
Griesbeck was shocked about such violent fanaticism. At the same time, he was fascinated by the passion that soccer can unleash. He wondered whether this obsession could not also be used for peaceful purposes. The rules, which he developed in order to pursue this idea, caused quite a stir.
Among other things, the rules state that two women must play on each team, and one of them must shoot the first goal. However, a team cannot only win by scoring goals, but rather also by whether they treat their opponent fairly or not. This rule seems absurd to the macho men in Comuna 13. According to these men, women have no business being on a soccer field.
With help from a sport institute, Griesbeck visited gang leaders, and among others, he met John Jairo. When the guest from Germany proposed that women should play on the street teams, Jairo immediately dismissed the idea. “But after awhile, he came back,” Griesbeck said, “maybe because of the new balls and jerseys which we are distributing.”
Still, John Jairo’s first attempted game seemed to be a disaster. The 18 teams arrived, and they were all accompanied by their gang leaders. While the wild guys were running at each other during the sixth game, John Jairo scored a penalty kick with one minute to go. This kick won the game. Afterwards, a player threatened him with a gun, and others threw rocks at him. John Jairo only escaped because the gang leaders demanded that they stop.
“Shortly afterwards, the man with the gun knocked on my door and apologized,” he said. “The gang leaders even gave me money as a sign of friendship, and then we threw a party which lasted until the next morning.”
After this experience, the pilot phase of the project “Futbol por la paz” was started. The mayor of Medellin was particularly interested in the project and offered public funds to support it. Griesbeck recalled: “Soon I had 70 athletes just in Manrique. They were ready to open the borders between the neighborhoods.” After a few months, there were 500 players in Medellin alone, then after a year 1,200 and then 12,000.
Under the motto “Futbol por la Paz” (soccer for peace), the project has spread to schools across the country, and the Colombian government adopted it in fall of 2002. It was then renamed “El Golombiao” and was expanded across the whole country. Today, 17,000 young people play on 1,600 teams.
Meanwhile, the rules are generally accepted and benefit the game, which is now rarely interrupted by fouls or fights. It is crucial, however, that the teams do their recruiting from the inexhaustible pool of street players, and not from soccer clubs. “Everyone is allowed to play: thieves, dealers, alcoholics, potheads, and murderers. We do not exclude anyone, but they must play by our rules,” said coach John Jairo, and he is proud of this.
In Colombia, “El Golombiao” is supported by national sponsors, UNICEF, and the German GTZ. Now it even belongs to a global network called “Streetfootballworld,” which has its office in Berlin. The responsible organization is the Jugendfußball Foundation, whose president is the former national player and trainer Jürgen Klinsmann.
“Amazing soccer comes from the street, and not from clubs,” Klinsmann said. As a player, he attracted worldwide attention because he attacked with the aggressive style of a street soccer player. “Amazing soccer has something wild and anarchic in it. In no way is it a simple sport.” World-class athletes are actually maladjusted people, who want to win no matter what. “No club can recruit these wild guys.”
“Vamos!” screamed John Jairo as he gathered his players around him, as well as his 30 year-old wife Yasmin and 14 year-old daughter Jorani. Nervously they listened to John Jairo preaching the rules to the teams once again. Not only do goals count but so do swear words and fouls. Fair gestures also count, for example, when a player helps another get up again. “And don’t forget: a woman must score the first goal. Let’s go!”
John Jairo stood on the edge of the field with his eyes shining. A team from Manrique is here in the middle of Comuna 13, and no one is getting hurt! That is already a small miracle. “I organize the game, but I am not the referee. There is no referee because the teams should work out their conflicts by themselves. The players learn how to control their frustration. And girls are good mediators, but only when they are included in the game,” John Jairo said.
What a fair game! Everyone yelled when a goal was scored. Soon John Jairo will turn over the teams to a local trainer and then take care of organizing new teams.
After the game, John Jairo and Carlos peacefully walked down the concrete steps to the valley leading to a school where they will meet with the director, Magdalena Caro. She has great hopes for the soccer project. “From our 1,000 students, at least one is murdered every month,” says Senora Caro. This is no surprise to Carlos, whose son was shot in 2003. But he doesn’t like to talk about this.
“Try your luck,” said the school teacher to the men who were going from classroom to classroom. John Jairo explained the game and wrote down the names of the boys and girls who wanted to participate. After an hour he had recruited 55 players. Tomorrow they will go on a trip to a nearby community in order to advertise “El Golombiao.”
How many athletes are there? They shrugged their shoulders and their scarred faces lit up in happiness. “Countless,” said John Jairo and Carlos elaborated - “in any case there are enough to kick the ball 100,000 times for peace.”