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Hummel ends sponsorship of Afghan football federation

Hummel has announced it will no longer sponsor Afghanistan’s football association after allegations emerged of physical, psychological and sexual abuse committed by male employees against players from the country’s women’s national team.

Published: 5 December 2018 17:38 CET

Hummel ends sponsorship of Afghan football federation

Afghan national team player Shabnam Mabarz with Hummel CEO Christian Stadil in 2016. Photo: AP Photos/Jan M. Olsen/Ritzau Scanpix

The Danish sports company informed Afghanistan’s football association (AFF) of its decision on November 29th.

Hummel head of communications Ulrik Feldskov Juul is in charge of the sports and fashion firm’s ‘Company Karma’ concept, which the Afghanistan team’s sponsorship was a part of.

Juul said that Hummel had been made aware of the allegations on November 26th by former Afghanistan national team captain Khalida Popal, who now lives in Denmark.

“I was presented with email correspondences and contacted various people who confirmed the allegations,” he said.

“We are breaking off the partnership because we do not want to be associated with the current management (of AFF). These are very, very serious allegations,” Juul said.

A week prior to the Hummel decision, an AFF contract showing restrictive conditions and taking rights away from female players was published on social media.

Several of the team’s players have been dropped from the squad after refusing to sign.

Juul said Hummel would continue to support Afghanistan’s female footballers.

“We have been very much involved in supporting women’s football there. We have nothing against the (Afghan) football association, just the current leadership,” he said.

“I think there will now be some focus on the disgusting conditions that exist for women in Afghan football. Grass roots work still exists there,” he said.

Hummel has said it would consider reviving the partnership once the ongoing issues have been resolved and after a change of AFF leadership.

FIFA announced on November 30th that it was investigating the case.

READ ALSO: Nadia Nadim: the refugee who became a Danish footballing role model

The Danish resident saving Afghanistan's women footballers one player at a time

Khalida Popal photographed in the stands of FC Nordsjaelland in Farum. Photo: Tariq Mikkel Khan / Ritzau Scanpix / AFP

Khalida Popal is more determined than ever to continue her fight for the emancipation of girls and women in her native country, where the Taliban do not allow women to play sports.

As she battles to bring football players out of the country, she hasn’t slept for days.

“We have managed to get 75 people out of Afghanistan, which includes players and their families” who have flown to Australia, Popal tells AFP, sitting in the stands of FC Nordsjaelland, the Danish first division team for which she works as commercial coordinator. “We are trying to get more players out of Afghanistan. We’ll do everything possible to get our players out.”

Popal, 34, came to Denmark from Afghanistan 10 years ago as a refugee. She has not slept since Afghanistan fell into the hands of the Taliban, her hands clasped tightly around her phone as she helps organise the evacuation of the players, together with professional players’ union FIFPro among others.

On her voicemail, she listens to desperate pleas for help. As manager of Afghanistan’s now-splintered national squad, she is the point-person for the players, who are in a state of shock. Some of them have been threatened by hardline Islamists, others beaten by the Taliban.

“I had to take the lead, together with my team, to help them to get out of Afghanistan. The players were crying, seeking protection, hopeless,” she says.

Tool for emancipation

She helped them “to regroup, to keep up hope and not give up. That was the toughest,” she said, describing herself as a “survivor”. For their safety, she won’t disclose any details about the players still in Afghanistan that they’re trying to get out. She looks exhausted, but her determination is visible.

For her, football is her passion. But more importantly, she sees it as a tool for the emancipation of Afghan women. Everything she learned on the pitch — team spirit, determination, perseverance — has come in useful these past few days. She recalls her own childhood in Afghanistan, one she says was stolen by the Taliban.

“I was not able to go to school, I was not able to participate in any social activities,” she explains. “We wanted to kind of take revenge and say ‘football is the way that we want to take revenge from the Taliban and the Taliban is our enemy’. That was our strong statement.”

Since the first women’s teams started emerging about 15 years ago, football has grown rapidly in Afghanistan. But it all disappeared overnight when Kabul fell to the Taliban.

“We had around 3,000 to 4,000 women and girls who were registered in the football federation at different levels: grassroots, elite level, and semi-elite level. We had referees, coaches, female coaches,” Popal says.

‘Our pride has been taken from us’

“After the fall of Kabul, that was all gone. That’s sad,” she says, her voice cracking.

The players’ future is unknown at this point. They “might play football, but they will not play as players of Afghanistan, because they will not have a country nor a national team.”

The Taliban “have changed the flag of Afghanistan, the flag we felt proud to see and play for. Our pride has been taken from us,” she said.

With US troops set to leave on August 31, Popal, whose parents also live in Denmark, fears her native country will be abandoned and forgotten.

“Once again, people will live in a dark time. And whatever humanitarian crisis and crime happens in Afghanistan, nobody will be able to report about it.”

Especially, she says, since the Taliban have become better at speaking to the international media.

But she will continue to use her own voice.

“As human beings, stand together with me and fight, and be the voice for every woman of Afghanistan,” she pleaded. “For every woman who is left in the country, every woman who feels betrayed and abandoned.”

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