London: The world’s best tennis player has no plans of embracing a political career, at least for the moment.
Asked about his political ambitions after a record fourth-in-a-row and fifth overall title at the season-ending Barclays ATP World Tour Finals, Novak Djokovic admitted that he would rather portray a positive image of his native Serbia by doing what he does best — playing tennis and helping people through various charities.
Djokovic claimed his fourth successive title with a fluent 6-3, 6-4 win over Roger Federer — a former six-time title holder — in the season-ender before a jam-packed O2 Arena late on Sunday.
“I’m obviously very proud to be representing my country. I try my best to represent it in the best possible way through my field of life, through my profession, through sport. It’s a very global sport, so you get a lot of attention. To be representing, of course, myself and my family, but also my country, is really a privilege, especially because Serbia last three or four decades has been through a lot of wars, troubles, bad press and stuff like these,” Djokovic related.
“I try to emphasise the good side of what Serbia and our people represent. I feel their love, I feel their support. I have the responsibility. Obviously, I feel that as well everywhere I go. But do I see myself in politics right now? No, I don’t. I feel like I can do for my country much more without getting in politics, through the work that I do, through my foundation and the many different ways that I can contribute to the positive image of my country,” he added.
However, that certainly does not mean that he is far removed from the happenings in his country despite being always on the move. “I do follow politics. Politics is part of everybody’s life. I try not to get politically involved because I think sport and politics should be at this level separated a little bit,” he said.
“But in many countries it’s all kind of linked to each other and I’m aware of that. But also I’m obviously somebody that is not competent maybe to talk about politics. But the way I see things right now, the political system in our country right now, as in many countries, doesn’t really work and that’s one of the reasons I’m not really interested to get into it.
“But who knows what the future brings. I need to be aware that it’s not only me making the decision, it’s my family, it’s the people who are close to me. It’s still a long way. I still see myself playing tennis, hopefully, on a high level for many years to come and when the time comes, we will see,” the 34-year-old added.
