Mexico's President Explains Absence from World Cup Match

The Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum, explained on Friday why she was absent from the Estadio Azteca during Mexico’s opening match with South Africa, saying tickets to the match were unaffordable for most Mexicans and that she had given her ticket to a young female soccer fan.

“Stadium tickets are very expensive,” Sheinbaum said during her daily morning news conference. “As president it’s better that I give my place to someone who couldn’t have gone, who loves football, especially a young woman, and I can celebrate it with the people for free.”

The soaring ticket prices for World Cup matches have become a major point of contention for the tournament, particularly in Mexico where tickets selling for an average of $3,000 are unthinkable to the majority of Mexicans who would barely make that in a month.

“Very few people can pay a ticket at that price,” Sheinbaum added. The young woman Sheinbaum referred to was Yolett Cervantes Cuaquehua, who won a national contest held by the Mexican government to claim the president’s ticket and sat in the VIP section to watch the game.

Cervantes, an Indigenous Nahua athlete from the state of Veracruz, submitted a viral video of herself wearing traditional dress and juggling a soccer ball with her bare feet. She beat 1,000 other finalists from across Mexico.

In the video, Cervantes explains that when she was eight, she won a state poetry contest: the prize was a trip to Spain to watch a soccer match. “Coming home I was in love with football, and at that moment I forgot about poetry,” she says. “My father trained me for four years. After two years I could juggle the ball 3,000 to 4,000 times.”

Announcing the contest in March, Sheinbaum framed it as a way to empower young women in the sport. “For many years, doors were closed to us – preventing us from becoming referees, soccer players, commentators or sports hosts,” she said at a news conference. “Today, we want to open those doors to women and their rights, so they can be whatever they want to be and have every opportunity to achieve it.”