Botswana has thrown her name (with six other countries) for consideration to host AFCON 2027 according to WEEKEND POST SPORT.CAF received four bids from six countries. Botswana is going solo following neighbor, Namibia’s last minute decision to withdraw from the joint bid dubbed BONA 2027.
The long wait for the Afcon 2027 host committee and the government to provide an update on the project has been one of the longest in the country’s history.
In an interview at BNSC warm up area this week, Tumiso Rakgare, the minister of Youth, Sports, and Culture said that due to the various factors that affected the project, the government decided to engage a South African consultant, Ruben Reddy Architects to produce the bid document.According to Rakgare, the consultants appointed by the government for the facility audit report recently at the tune of P2, 227, 000. 00.
They have also produced documents for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, the Commonwealth Games, and the Russia 2018 World Cup. He is confident that they will be able to produce a competitive bid document.
Ruben Reddy Architects has quoted a whopping P65, 656, 355.00 to develop the bid-document. Furthermore Sports Minister Tumiso Rakgare said based on the 60:40 principle agreed between Namibia and Botswana before ditching the joint-bid, Botswana was to pay a sum of P39, 393, 813,00 whereas the Namibia were to fork out P26, 262, 542.00 from their coffers.
Now because Namibia have withdrawn from the joint-bid, the government will pay the entire P65, 656,355.00 just for the bid-document which is being developed by the consultants.
CAF has since set 23 May 2023 as the deadline for member associations to submit their final bid documents, including all bidding and hosting documents (hosting agreement, host cities agreement, government guarantees) which should be duly signed.
Rakgare noted that the facility audit report submitted by Namibia and Botswana before they withdrew from the joint-bid suggested that they needed over P4.6 billion to construct two new stadiums and renovate the three existing ones. As per the requirements of the Confederation of African Football (CAF), they should have at least six stadiums to host the event.Rakgare revealed that the two-year Transitional National Development Plan has a development budget of over 20 billion Pula which can be refocused to infrastructure development connected to the 2027 AFCON.
“Then again, we would still have the whole of the 2025/2026 financial year and part of the 2026/2027 financial year to finance the deficit, noting that a sizeable part of the funds required for development of infrastructure will also come from the private sector,” he shared with the media this week.
The Sports minister said learning from past hosts of AFCON, they estimate that more than 10, 000 jobs will be created over a minimum of 2 years from the capital works that would have to be undertaken such as the construction of stadiums. It is estimated that the stadiums will cost around U$D 67.5 million which is equivalent to P500 million and over 2000 people are expected to be employed.
Meanwhile many observers believe that hosting the Afcon 2027 is an expensive exercise “unless it being used a political gimmick” as the country is going to the polls next year.
The inspection by CAF officials is expected to start on the 1st of June to 15th June, with selection of the tournament’s host country expected before September.
@Weekendpost.co.bw
