October 11, 2007
By Ndaba Dlamini
CONSTRUCTION work at Soccer City in Nasrec - the venue for the opening ceremony and opening and final matches of the 2010 Fifa World CupÔ - is progressing well and is already 18 percent complete.
This was the word of the chief communications officer of the 2010 Local Organising Committee (LOC), Tim Modise, after a tour of the construction site by a Fifa and LOC delegation earlier this week.
Over three days, delegates, composed of experts in the fields of competitions, marketing, information technology, media, accommodation, stadium construction and transport, visited four of the nine World Cup host cities. Besides Joburg, they stopped off in Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Durban.
Such site visits are standard procedure in preparation for any Fifa competition; they are undertaken to get a better understanding of the state of preparedness of the host countries, as well as to strengthen relationships with local authorities.
Fifa's Adam Brown, Francis Tellier and Jorg Sander
Modise said work at Soccer City was expected to be completed by May 2009, five months ahead of the Fifa deadline. The stadium is being revamped at a cost of R1,5-billion, with seating increasing from the present 70 000 to 94 000.
Fifa's head of media operations, Alan Leiblang, said he was "very happy" with the progress at the stadium.
Summing up the tour of Soccer City, Greenpoint Stadium in Cape Town, the Nelson Mandela Metro Stadium in Port Elizabeth and Durban's Moses Mabhida Stadium, Leiblang said huge transformation could be detected in the host cities.
"The task ahead is a big one and we admire the ambition and efforts in the host cities to make 2010 a successful event."
Reiterating Leiblang's comments, the LOC chief competitions officer, Dennis Mumble, said even though the programme was on track there were "challenges and adjustments" that needed to be made.
"The quality and organisation of the inspection tour has been excellent, especially the presentations given by all the host cities we have visited. The organising committee is very happy with the progress being made and believe more than ever that we are on track to host an extremely successful 2010 Fifa World Cup™."
A full report of the tour will be presented on Tuesday, 16 October to the board of the organising committee. Fifa's general secretary, Jerome Valcke, will attend that presentation.
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