The least expensive seats for Sunday’s exhibition game between Brazil and England — the first major test event at Rio de Janeiro’s renovated Maracana Stadium — in a country where the official minimum monthly salary is $339, the cheapest will be 90 reals ($45). That is 30 times more than the cheapest seat eight years ago at the historic stadium.
“The giant price change means there is a shift concerning the kind of people that are going to the new stadiums,” said Erick Omena de Melo, a native of Rio de Janeiro who is working on a doctorate in city planning at Oxford University in England. “It was previously a much more diverse place in the stadiums. But as the economy in Brazil changes, they are converting these stadiums to a much more middle-class, upper-middle class or even upper-class place that is much less for the lower-middle class and poor.”
Traditional general admission is being eliminated with luxury boxes and modern seating taking over at the six stadiums being used for the Confederations Cup, and the additional six that are to be ready for the World Cup.
“What’s being done so far is transferring a European model to Brazil,” said Omena de Melo, who is working on a book about the social history of Maracana. “But Brazil is really different. It’s a totally different atmosphere at a football game. The changes are seen by many as a huge aggression against the traditional fans, the traditional crowds at football matches.”
“Poor people also can’t buy tickets in England or the United States,” Rio de Janeiro sports journalist Telmo Zanini said. “It’s a question of the market. You don’t see poor people buying tickets for Los Angeles Lakers games.”
Brasil is spending an estimated $3.5 billion on new stadiums and refurbishments, though most of the project has run behind schedule. The need to work 24-7 to finish the venues will run up the costs by millions more. The new national stadium in Brasilia opened at a cost of more than $590 million, the most expensive of the 12 World Cup venues. But it has no local team to call it home, and many say it’s a “white elephant.” Another stadium is going up in Manaus in the northern state of Amazonas — again with no local team. It’s the same in the southwestern city of Cuiaba, also without a team in Brazil’s top league. Brazilian Sports Minister Aldo Rebelo, a Brazilian Communist Party member, suggested they would be good places for businesses to hold conventions, shows and fairs.
Benefiting from many of the changes is a multinational consortium that won a contract in May from the state of Rio de Janeiro to run Maracana for 35 years. The consortium is made up of Brazilian construction conglomerate Odebrecht, Los Angeles-based Sports and entertainment company AEG, and the sport and entertainment company IMX, which is owned by Brazilian billionaire Eike Batista. Critics say the deal gives the Rio de Janeiro state government less money than it invested in the venue and will lead to the demolition of an indigenous museum, a public school and some athletics facilities in the area. A public prosecutor estimated that $615 million in public money has been spent on Maracana since 2005, raising questions why a private consortium should reap most of the profits from taxpayer money. Pele has come out against the privatization, saying the famous stadium “must be of the people, for the Brazilian people.”
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