Moorosi Tsiane
GENDER and Youth, Sports and Recreation minister Mahali Phamotse made a bold declaration last week that the country would continue hosting the 2020 African Union Sport Council (AUSC) Region 5 Games despite a critical legal opinion from the Ministry of Finance.
Ministry of Finance officials recently warned that proceeding with the project would be tantamount to signing a blank cheque that would leave the country in serious debt.
The AUSC games are held biennially and are hosted on rotational basis by 10 Region 5 members.
Lesotho has already missed out on hosting the games in 2003 and were slapped with a M1.5 million fine.
The country doesn’t have the estimated M2.4 billion needed to construct new stadium and other facilities for the games.
According to a Ministry of Finance legal opinion presented to the parliamentary public accounts committee (PAC) recently, taking a loan from Property 2000 (PTY) LTD, which has already promised to invest in the projects, will leave the country in enormous debt.
Part of the money will be used in the construction of a 40 000-seater football stadium and a 3000-seater indoor arena. The money will also be used to construct the games village which will accommodate 3000 people.
Last week Phamotse however, stood her ground and told the national assembly that there is no going back as the processes leading to the construction were already in motion.
The country’s previous regimes have never prioritised sports and our athletes have continued producing mediocre performances when they perform in international competitions.
Some of the poor performances have all be because the country does not have facilities of international standards that can be used by our athletes for training and hosting of games.
After the December 2020 AUSC Region 5 Games, Lesotho is also expected to host the 2022 African Youth Games, hence it needs the infrastructure.
This project is marred with so much controversy as some top government officials claim proper tendering and procurement measures were not followed when awarding it.
I will not dwell on the politics because that is how most government officials work.
However, I stand with Phamotse on this one. The hypocrisy must stop and people must stop making us to believe that they want the project stopped because they have the country’s interests at heart whereas all they want is just a piece of the pie.
Of course, it is late now to build the facilities which are expected to be completed at least by September 2020. However, I think we should also try to find out why this project was delayed in the first place. It would not be surprising that someone at the top didn’t want it to happen for some reason.
The rumour mill also has it that some politicians have been scrambling for a stake in the project and while this could be just rumours, we need politicians who have the country’s interests at heart.
This is not the first loan that the country is acquiring and I find it funny that some want the project stopped because its funded by a loan.
This infrastructure will be part of the legacy projects that will be used to promote the growth of local sports long after the regional showpiece and it is important for the country to have it.
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent those of the Lesotho Times but those of the author.
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