(ATR) Around the Rings learns that South Africa is highly unlikely to throw its hat into the ring for the 2024 Olympics.
Gideon Sam, president of the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (SASCOC), tells ATR that there won’t be any discussion about a possible Olympic bid for months. The IOC expects expressions of interest by the end of February.
"For now all our attention is on the 2022 Commonwealth Games," Sam said.
Durban is competing with Edmonton, Canada for the rights to host the Games.
South Africa has expressed an interest in staging the Olympics at some stage, with the suggestion that the government and SASCOC might respond positively to the IOC’s invitation to NOCs sent out two weeks’ ago. The Olympics has never been staged on the African continent.
SASCOC leaders perhaps feel that talk about a possible Olympic bid might jeopardise its hopes of landing the Commonwealth Games.
Sam repeated the view of the SASCOC board made public two weeks’ ago, indicating that consideration of an Olympic bid is off the radar until the 2022 Games host is chosen. He said it was a board decision: "The board feels we are not talking about 2024, we did not say we are not interested in 2024."
"That’s our position for now, a focus on the Commonwealth Games. After that we will see what the appetite is for something else," the SASCOC president said.
The IOC’s timetable for the 2024 bidding process appears to rule out any South African bid.
IOC president Thomas Bach is keen to engage in discussions with potential bidders from March onwards as part of the new invitation phase that precedes the applicant phase launching on Sept. 15. NOCs must submit letters of application by that date.
Sam said South Africa had "never said yes or no" to a 2024 Olympic bid "because we don’t know what is going to happen" with the country’s Commonwealth Games ambition.
Sam said SASCOC had received the IOC invitation to bid, which went outto all 205 NOCs worldwide on Jan. 15. He indicated that pitching anOlympic bid to South African citizens would be a tough sell alongsidethe current Commonwealth Games bid.
His remarks suggest South Africa’s Olympic leaders have no plans to consider a 2024 bid or hold talks with the IOC about one in the coming months. And it will simply be too late in the IOC process after the Sept. 2 vote on the 2022 Games host scheduled at the Commonwealth Games Federation general assembly in Auckland.
Boston and Rome are so far the only confirmed bids for the 2024 Olympics, but other bids are possible from Berlin/ Hamburg, Paris and possibly Qatar. The IOC selects a host at the Session in 2017.
Reported by Mark Bisson
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