Durban is South Africa’s preferred candidate to host the first Olympics in Africa. South Africa is bidding to host the 2036 or 2040 Summer Olympics and Paralympics. The International Olympic Committee will choose the host city for 2036 in mid-2029.
The country’s choice to put forward Durban, South Africa’s third-biggest city, was announced by the acting president of the South African Sports Confederation, Olympic and Paralympic Committee, Lwandile Simelane, on Thursday. She said Durban would be the main candidate city for South Africa’s bid, but it would likely be a “multi-city bid” that would propose a number of events to be held in other cities. South Africa’s economic hubs of Johannesburg and Cape Town were also considered as candidate cities.
Durban, a city of about 4 million on the subtropical Indian Ocean coast, was touted as a possible Olympic host city more than a decade ago following South Africa’s staging of the 2010 football World Cup, the first in Africa. But an official bid did not materialise then, largely due to concerns over costs. The city was stripped of hosting the 2022 Commonwealth Games because it could not make financial or other guarantees required for that event.
Officials said on Thursday they were not yet able to provide any estimates of the cost to South Africa of staging the Olympics if its bid were successful. They said Durban’s bid would be centred on the 56,000-seat Moses Mabhida Stadium, which was built for the 2010 World Cup. South Africa is among seven countries bidding for the 2036 Games.
The others are India, Qatar, South Korea, Germany, Hungary and Turkiye. The IOC gave October 31 as the deadline for national Olympic committees to formally declare their interest in bidding for the 2036 Games. Candidates have an opportunity to make virtual presentations to the IOC next month to start the official bidding process.
A key date is in March, the IOC has said, when its board will approve a shortlist of candidates. If it wins, South Africa would be the first African host of the Summer Games since the modern Olympics was created in 1896. Africa’s biggest economy previously failed with a bid to stage the 2004 Games in Cape Town.
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