The Cabinet should take the 2010 Soccer World Cup semifinal away from Cape Town if residents go to court to block the proposed Green Point Stadium development, politicians overseeing sport have recommended.
Western Cape sport minister Whitey Jacobs said the recommendation was adopted at a Minmec — a meeting between a national minister and his provincial counterparts — by Minister of Sport and Recreation Makhenkesi Stofile and provincial ministers in Durban on Thursday.
Earlier this week, mayor Helen Zille had warned that objections to the project could result in the city losing the semifinal to Johannesburg.
Jacobs said all the stadiums being prepared for the tournament have to be ready by the end of 2009 and for this to happen construction has to start in January next year.
This led to discussion in the Minmec on whether Green Point would meet the January deadline, in the light of a threat by the Green Point Common Association to go to court.
”The feeling in the Minmec was that if the matter goes to court, it goes out of our hands,” he said.
The Minmec resolved to recommend that the Cabinet should take a formal decision that all stadiums have to be finished by the end of 2009 ”and that if residents of Green Point take the matter to court, another venue be found outside the province of the Western Cape”.
One implication of this is that practice venues being planned for elsewhere in Cape Town would not be built either.
”I’m hoping that it doesn’t reach that stage, because it’s going to affect lots of things,” Jacobs said. ”We hope it doesn’t come to the point that the Cabinet takes a decision that another stadium be used.” — Sapa