Fifa joins chorus: World Cup 2010 100 percent secure

By LUXOLO MANTAMBO
and LUBABALO NGCUKANA

WORLD soccer governing body Fifa yesterday denied reports that South Africa could lose its rights to host the biggest sporting showpiece in 2010 to Australia.

Head of Fifa’s South Africa office, Michael Palmer, told reporters: “That is absolutely untrue, 100%. There is no contingency plan at all. Someone has made that up. We absolutely, categorically deny it.”

Palmer was responding to a weekend media report that Australia had been put on standby as host, should South Africa fail to meet the 2008 deadline for the building of stadiums.

He said Fifa president Sepp Blatter spent many years ensuring that the event came to Africa.

Sport and Recreation Minister Makhenkesi Stofile also dismissed these reports, saying construction on all the stadiums would be completed by 2009 at the latest. “I have been assured by highly qualified experts in the construction industry that all our infrastructure will be completed by the right time,” Stofile said. “And I believe them.”

He said work on eight of the 10 stadiums earmarked to host the games would be finished by December 2008, with the two remaining stadiums being completed by early 2009.

The ANC yesterday joined the chorus of people condemning the report.

In a statement issued yesterday, the party described the claims as a “transparent attempt to promote a particular political agenda”.

“The main contention in the report has been dismissed as untrue and ludicrous,” said the statement.

Four of the 10 stadiums to be used during the world’s greatest showpiece must still be built, with Durban’s being the only one on which construction has started.

Construction on the Port Elizabeth stadium will begin in October.

“As far as the timeframe is concerned, construction must begin at least in October this year. Any reports suggesting we will not be ready for 2010 are irresponsible, inaccurate and should be condemned,” Nelson Mandela’s spokesperson Roland Williams said yesterday.

Cape Town’s director of Programme Management and acting Western Cape 2010 director, Dave Hugo, said that city was planning to start building a stadium in January next year.

“We are confident the work will be done in time. We are in the process of finalising provisional business plans and some documents, and that should be finished by the end of this week,” he said.

In Germany, some stadiums took more than two years to complete including the Munich stadium and the Berlin Olympic stadium. The Frankfurt stadium took three years to get a facelift.