Internationally, however, a critical eye turned to Australia and its policies
towards Aboriginal Australians and its treatment of asylum-seeking boat people.
Without the Olympic focus there would have been much less international
awareness of these issues. Australian Olympic, business and governmental
figures clearly anticipated this possibility and attempted to forestall or silence
internal opposition. In the run-up to the Sydney Games, Australian Prime
Minister John Howard labelled protests an ‘un-Australian’ hindrance to promoting
a successful Games as evidence of Australian unity of will, spirit and
expertise, and of its love-affair with sport. In promoting national characteristics
for domestic and international consumption, Howard and other public figures
placed sport at the centre, thus helping to legitimate the vast sums of public
money diverted into the elite athlete production system and the building of
facilities and infrastructure to support the Games