adminSikhumbuzo Moyo Senior Sports Reporter
PREPARATIONS for the African Union Sports Council Region Five Under-20 Games that will be held in Bulawayo in December are now at peak level with organisers expressing confidence that they will meet the September 30 deadline.The Games will be held at various venues in the city from December 5-15.
In an interview with Chronicle Sport yesterday, the local organising committee’s chairperson Khonzani Ncube said all the identified venues have people on the ground who are busy with refurbishments.
“So far so good,” said Ncube.
“We are in full momentum now with our preparations. If you go around the venues you will see people busy sprucing up the places and we remain confident that come September 30, we will be able to hand over these venues to the regional organising committee,” said Ncube.
The local organising committee have signed a service-level agreement with the Bulawayo City Council that has seen the council handing over its properties to the committee for refurbishments.
Construction work is already underway at Barbourfields, Luveve and White City stadiums as well as the city pools.
She expressed gratitude for the support that her committee has been receiving from even the highest office in government and the Ministry of Sports in particular through Minister Andrew Langa who is always enquiring on the progress and challenges that the committee could be facing.
“Treasury has released funds for this project and I can safely say that we are now adequately resourced to meet expectations of the regional organising committee. We will be able to deliver as expected because we have never failed as Zimbabwe, failure is not part of our vocabulary as a country,” said Ncube.
Meanwhile, the local organising committee has lined up a number of marketing strategies meant to drum up support for the Games in the city, the country and the region at large.
“By the end of this month, we should be having that programme rolling, the plan is already in place to market the Games. My appeal especially to the people of Bulawayo is to embrace these Games and work along with us so that we leave a legacy as Zimbabwe and Bulawayo in particular,” said Ncube.
Ten countries from the Southern Region will be in Bulawayo and compete in nine different sports codes, namely athletics, athletics for the visually impaired, basketball, boxing, football, netball, swimming, tennis and golf which was previously not part of the Games but Zimbabwe, as the hosts, were given the prerogative of adding one more sport code.
Zimbabwe has already submitted its list of 206 athletes to the organising committee which will go into pre-camp soon before going fulltime on November 22.
Online Reporter