A possible new case of racism broke out this weekend in Colombian soccer. The accusation was made Marco Pérez, striker for Águilas Doradas, in the press conference after the game that his team lost 3-1 against Unión Magdalena in Santa Marta.
Pérez assured that Alexander Mejía, captain of the Unión Magdalena, called him a “slave”, which is why he asked to attend the press conference to give his version of the facts.
“I am a little sad because Mejía calls me my slave, and that is a word that we cannot use here in Colombia. The truth is that I am very sad, I told the teacher (Lucas González, DT of Águilas) to let me come to the press conference and this cannot remain like this,” Pérez assured.
Marco Pérez, a Águilas Doradas player, publicly denounced Alexander Mejía, for calling him a “slave” during the development of the game held at the Sierra Nevada stadium. pic.twitter.com/ainS97CXfB
— Juank Cardona (@JuankCardonaF) April 3, 2023
Through a press release, the Águilas Doradas club supported Pérez’s version and described Mejía’s attitudes as “racist, offensive, discriminatory and segregating.”
The precedent of 2018: Lucero Álvarez was punished
Already in Colombian soccer there was a precedent for racism, which was punished by the disciplinary commissions of Dimayor. The penalized was the Uruguayan goalkeeper Lucero Álvarez, who, curiously, at that time, in the second half of 2018, was playing for Águilas Doradas.
On September 10 of that year, in a controversial press conference, the then coach of Once Caldas, Hubert Bodhert, accused Álvarez of racist insults.
“Lucero took (Johan) Carbonero as “black…”, to insult me. I told him that he has to respect. We are not indigenous. A foreigner cannot come to mistreat us. We are proud to be black. A player cannot come big to mistreat a 20-year-old. I demanded respect from him. The referee was there,” Bodhert said that day. The judge of that match was Nolberto Ararat.
After studying the referee’s report, Álvarez received eight suspension dates and a fine of more than 31 million pesos for “using offensive, discriminatory, racist language against a member of the opposing team’s coaching staff.”
The Uruguayan defended himself by acknowledging that he had insulted Bodhert, but denied the racist insults and assured that he had been threatened with death for what happened. The club appealed and the sanction was reduced to five dates.
Álvarez played three more games after the suspension and then left Águilas Doradas and Colombian soccer. Today, at 38, he plays for Progreso, in his country’s second division.
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