In May 2018, while Yasmine Chouaki (In Sol Major), was interviewing me in the RFI studio on Western Tchoukoutou, my last novel at the time, there was a sudden break in the exchanges. I immediately heard the voice of a journalist reporting live on the final of the 1970 World Cup in Mexico. In Portuguese, the reporter, as Latinos know how to do with their pronounced taste for drama, chanted the name of Pelé, dragged on the two syllables, then exploded in an interminable breath. "Goal! Goal! Goal! Goal! Goal!" For nearly thirty seconds, he raved about the performance of the Brazilian No. 10, raised a mountain of superlatives, thus accompanying the delirium that shook the Aztec stadium. It was the coronation of an exceptional eleven with, as an undeniable asset, Edson Arantes do Nascimento alias Pelé who had just splashed, with his talent, the last final of a World Cup which he won for the third time.
In the studio at RFI, this day in May 2018, Yasmine Chouaki wanted to illustrate, with this audio, a memory of my green years in Pobé where in 1970, I had followed, alongside my sisters and brothers, this unforgettable match with this samba football made of round leather designers and artists. Born of a mother da Costa, therefore of Afro-Brazilian origin, I could only be a supporter of Brazil and above all, a fanatic of Pelé. Admittedly, we had never seen him play - at that time, television did not exist - but we credited him with an extraordinary game, such as, for example, dribbling the ten outfield players of the opposing team and scoring goals. Or like, doing backheels, performing scissors, lobbing goalkeepers, trying to score from the center circle. Technical gestures that have become commonplace today, but at the time revolutionary because they didn't exist and in inventing them, Pelé had dressed them with an elegance, a natural class. The videos, showing them to us afterwards, were not far from our imagination.
What was extraordinary about this man was that he had evolved during the era of the great butchers. The acts of anti-game were legion and the rough players, especially the rigid defenders, organized against the Brazilian prodigy a marking with the pants.
He often managed to dribble past them and evade them, even if these shin-eaters sometimes got together to put him in difficulty. Because, Pelé, it was not only fine gestures, it was efficiency, a thousand goals, European, African and world tours with his forever club, the Santos Club. He had a crazy charm, a sunny smile, beauty, charisma. At the height of his glory, his country's government had even declared him a "living national treasure"!
Today, when he transformed himself into a star to join Maradona, Cruft and Eusebio in heaven, the king, who no longer belonged to his Brazil, has become more than a treasure: the eternal heritage of 'humanity.
Thank you, Edson Arantes do Nascimento!
Thank you, O roy!
By Florent Raoul Couao-Zotti
*This article has been translated from French into English by Marcus Boni Teiga
