Rock, samba party in Rio to await 2016 Olympics vote result (Feature)

By Diana Renee Oct 1, 2009, 17:51 GMT

   Rio de Janeiro - Whether or not their city is chosen to host the 2016 Olympics, tens of thousands of residents of Rio de Janeiro are set to party Friday in the world-famous Copacabana beach.

'We have reasons to celebrate even just the fact of having got to the home stretch as favourites,' said Rio's municipal Tourism secretary, Antonio Figueira de Mello.

According to Figueira de Mello, at least 100,000 people are set to attend the party that was organized by city authorities to follow the vote of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in Copenhagen.

It is set to start at 10 am (1300 GMT) with a rock show by the singer Lulu Santos and it is scheduled to end many hours later with a performance by the percussionists of the Salgueiro samba school, the champion of the 2009 Rio Carnival. Bands will perform on a huge stage on the beach, in front of the traditional Copacabana Palace hotel.

Two giant screens were set to broadcast live the vote in the Danish capital, as well as messages of support for Rio from Brazilian artists and Olympic medallists, like yachtsman Torben Grael, judoka Flavio Canto and athlete Maurren Maggi.

   City and state authorities made Friday a holiday for public-sector workers, and they used the radio and television to call upon 'cariocas' to attend the party in the national colours, green and yellow.

'We will have a Carnival on Copacabana beach,' said Figueira de Mello.

He noted that city authorities will set up marquees where people can paint their faces with the national colours if they wish.

Besides, the authorities commissioned a flag with a surface of 2,200 square metres expected to weigh 800 kilogrammes. Fans are to unfold the flag on the beach, although the drawing on the cloth was top secret Thursday.

And yet support for Rio's Olympic bid was not unanimous. In an article that was published Thursday in the daily Folha de Sao Paulo, the prestigious sports commentator Juca Kfouri said he was hoping for a new defeat, like those Rio already suffered in its bids for the 2004 and 2012 Games.

'A country that does not give the slightest importance to sport as an instrument for public health or social inclusion is not right to bid to host the Olympic Games,' Kfouri argued.

For the commentator, a win for Rio Friday in Copenhagen would be 'one of the biggest surprises' of his life.

   Whatever the result of the IOC vote, the truth is that Salgueiro's percussionists are set to go on stage as soon as the name of the host of the 2016 Olympics is announced in Copenhagen: samba will serve to kick off a joyous party, or at least to wipe off the city's tears in defeat.