By Newsfeed/AP
RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Brazil’s Ronaldinho has found a second calling after retiring from professional football: combining music with political involvement.
The former Brazil national and FC Barcelona megastar has released a song along with Brazilian singer Jorge Vercillo decrying corruption in their country.
The 2005 Golden Ball award winner appears in a video, recorded in a studio, wearing a black beret and a white tank top decorated with the image of Saint George slaying a dragon.
Halfway through the duet, he plays drums, then breaks out in a 30-second solo. “Love is our game, from start to finish, in my heart, there are no longer enemies,” he sings.
He then asks the armor-clad Christian saint to slay “the dragon of greed” and corruption, while a chorus bemoans the squandering of public funds in detriment of “schools and hospitals.”
This is not the first musical outing for Ronaldinho, 39, who hung up his football cleats in January 2018.
He has also performed with Tunisian rapper K2rhym and was featured in the official World Cup 2018 song performed by Will Smith, Nicky Jam, and Era Istrefi.
Ronaldinho even made a surprise appearance playing drums at the World Cup closing ceremony at Moscow’s Luzhniki Stadium.
The famous midfielder, however, is not free of controversy: in November 2018, a court ordered that his passport and that of his brother Roberto be withheld for failing to pay a US$2.3 million fine for environmental damage incurred during the building of a property in Rio Grande do Sul, in southern Brazil.
And during last year’s presidential campaign, he joined the far-right PRB party and threw his support behind their candidate Jair Bolsonaro.