The world’s number-one tennis player was deported from Australia on the eve of a major tournament.
Lesson summary
Hi there, I’m Jeff and this is Plain English, where we help you upgrade your English with current events and trending topics. Nothing is more trending now than the case of Novak Djokovic, the world’s number-on tennis player, and his unsuccessful attempt to play in the Australian Open. So that is what we’ll talk about today, January 31, 2022. This is lesson 438 and JR, the producer, has uploaded the full lesson to PlainEnglish.com/438.
There’s a lot of new and technical vocabulary in this lesson, so if you’re a member of Plain English Plus+ , you might want to take a look at the translations that are built right into the transcripts on this one. Those are available in nine languages; if you’re not yet a member of Plain English Plus+, you can sign up today and get those translations by visiting PlainEnglish.com/Plus .
The English expression that we’ll review today is “on the eve of.” And we have a quote of the week from actor Sidney Poitier. Let’s get going.
Novak Djokovic deported from Australia on eve of tournament
When Novak Djokovic boarded an Emirates flight from Melboure, Australia, to Dubai on January 16, it capped a two-week saga in which the tennis star was at first denied an entry visa, then detained at a quarantine hotel, eventually released to practice on the tennis courts of Rod Laver Arena, only to have his visa canceled a second time. He lost an appeal to a three-judge panel and was on a flight out of the country hours after the decision was handed down.
The controversial case hinges on Djokovic’s contention that he was eligible for a medical exemption to Australia’s strict vaccination rules. In November this year, Djokovic, who is not vaccinated , had signaled that he probably wouldn’t be able to play in the Australian Open because Australia requires anyone entering the country either to be vaccinated or to have a medical exemption.
However, on December 16, the Serbian tennis star tested positive for COVID-19. That, he believed, would qualify him for a medical exemption to Australia’s strict vaccination rules. Therefore, he decided to enter the tournament.
But when Djokovic arrived at the airport in Melbourne, Australia, on January 5, he was denied entry into the country because he was not vaccinated. Immigration authorities did not accept his recent test as legitimate grounds for a medical exemption.
How could that be? It turns out that the medical exemption is not straightforward. Australian immigration authorities may grant a medical exemption in cases where a vaccine would endanger the health of a person entering. One possible reason a vaccine would be dangerous is a recent, bad case of COVID-19. But a positive test by itself does not guarantee an exemption.
Djokovic did not suffer bad COVID-19 symptoms, and he was entering Australia to play in an elite tennis tournament. In the opinion of Australia’s immigration authorities, he was in fine health and a vaccine would not have endangered his health at all. His positive test, therefore, did not make him eligible for a medical exemption.
Djokovic, the number-one ranked tennis player in the world, stayed in a government quarantine hotel with refugees and asylum seekers while his case was appealed. After four days, a judge reinstated his visa on technical grounds. That means the judge didn’t rule Djokovic was eligible to stay, just that the government hadn’t followed the correct procedure in detaining him. He was released from quarantine on January 10 and began practicing at Rod Laver Arena, the site of the tournament. He was scheduled to play in the first round on January 17.
But Alex Hawke, Australia’s Minister for Immigration, had the right to personally refuse Djokovic’s visa even after he had been released. And on January 14, Hawke did just that. He said that it was not in the public interest to allow the unvaccinated Djokovic to stay. Australia’s rules give wide latitude to the Minister for Immigration to make these decisions.
The tennis star made a last-ditch appeal to a three-judge panel. However, the judges upheld Hawke’s decision to revoke Djokovic’s visa. The judges stressed that they upheld only that Hawke had the authority to do what he did; they did not comment on whether it was a good decision or not. Djokovic left the country on the eve of the tournament, Sunday night, January 16, on an Emirates flight heading to Dubai.
There are several other relevant facts to the case. On his entry form, Djokovic declared that he had not traveled from his home in Monte Carlo in the 14 days prior to his flight. But he was seen in both his native Serbia and in Spain during that period. He says the error was an honest mistake.
After receiving his positive PCR test on December 16, he cancelled his appointments and public appearances, but he proceeded to have an interview and photo shoot with a French sports magazine. He says it was a mistake to do that.
Since the onset of the pandemic, Djokovic has been a critic of vaccine mandates and he has lived the life of a global superstar. During that same time, however, Australians have lived under the longest pandemic lockdown rules of any country. Melbourne, specifically, had six different periods in which residents were ordered to stay at home; they totaled 262 days from March 2020 through October 2021.
Even within Australia, state borders were closed for many months. Citizens found themselves stranded either in the wrong Australian states or outside the country, unable to get in for long periods at a time . Today, over 92 percent of Australian adults are vaccinated with at least two doses, one of the highest rates anywhere. While the Omicron variant is spreading in Australia, the country has had one of the lowest death rates of COVID-19 in the world.
That, therefore, is the context in which Djokovic wanted to enter the country without a vaccine. From the perspective of many Australians, Djokovic was an entitled celebrity asking to be exempted from rules Australians have dutifully followed for almost two years. And judging from his Instagram feed, the tennis star has barely been inconvenienced by the pandemic.
Djokovic has won the Australian Open nine times, more than any other player in the history of the tournament. If he had won this year, he would also have held the title for the most Grand Slam championships ever; as it stands today, he, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer, are all tied with twenty.
Not a surprising outcome
The one thing about this that shocks me is that the Minister for Immigration, an elected official, a politician, has the authority to act on the case of a single person. That is unusual. To me, a politician should write the rules, but not act on individual cases. Especially in a high-profile case like this, a politician will be just too tempted to judge an individual based on what public opinion is like. A lot of the backlash against this decision is about how Alex Hawke was trying to boost his own popularity by kicking out a high-profile person. And I think they have a valid point about that.
However, anyone who’s paying attention knows that Australia does not fool around with COVID. They are an island nation and they decided, from the beginning, to seal the borders, lock down their cities, and keep COVID out. Australians are now over 92 percent vaccinated. They have paid a steep price. And I just feel that if you want to go there, you need to respect that.
So here comes Djokovic, who lives in Monte Carlo, a playpen for the ultrarich and famous, with a glamorous Instagram feed, doing a magazine interview after a positive test, making a false statement on his travel declaration, proudly declaring he’s not vaccinated—and he wants to play for almost A$3 million prize. Djokovic has the right to be disappointed, he has the right to feel singled out by this action by the government, he has the right to even say it’s unfair, but I don’t think he has the right to be surprised.
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