By Rochelle de Kock

While Nelson Mandela Bay recently celebrated a milestone in the construction of the 2010 stadium, construction at the Mthatha stadium, earmarked as a base camp for foreign soccer teams, is at a standstill due to delayed funding from the Eastern Cape sports, recreation, arts and culture department.

Construction of the stadium is unlikely to meet its March 2010 deadline, as building has been stalled since its starting date in November, due to tender delays and a legal tussle between the King Sabata Dalindyebo (KSD) municipality and the Zimbane community in Mthatha.

KSD council chairman Mlibo Qoboshiyana, said the problem lay with construction of the stadium.

“We have to re-issue tenders because there was a problem with funding. We could not give the go-ahead to builders until we were sure that we had funds to pay them.

“We will have to redo the entire process and advertise for tenders again. This is a 90-day process,” Qoboshiyana said.

Departmental spokesman Malehlo Honolo Mlabateki said funds had been transferred to the municipality some time ago. She did not know why there was a delay.

The land dispute between the Zimbane community and the municipality was a claim on a piece of land in excess of 3400 hectares within the municipality, including the site earmarked for the Mthatha stadium.

The community was fighting to have a say in the development of the land in Vulindlela Road, which it claimed was taken away under the Republic of Transkei.

Qoboshiyana said the community had sued the municipality over the land claim. “It‘s a problem that should have been sorted out with the Land Rights Commissioner.

Although construction of the stadium is at a standstill, Qoboshiyana is optimistic that something could still be done “to make it a playable training ground”.

“We anticipate that the March 2010 deadline will not be met, but we‘ll see what we can do because 2010 was going to be a kick-start for the stadium,” Qoboshiyana said.

The stadium, he said, was not being built solely for the World Cup, but rather as a multi-purpose stadium for Mthatha.

Mlabateki said the stadium had been earmarked as a base camp should one of the countries be interested in being based there.

She said R100-million had been allocated for the stadium for the 2008/09 financial year and R120-million had been budgeted for 2009/10.

“The stadium was not meant for the World Cup, but it has always been in the department's pipeline to assist in building a stadium near Mthatha.”

Since construction will not be completed by March next year, Mlabateki said the department had refurbished the Rotary Stadium and had new artificial turf. This could be used as an alternative.

There were a number of stadiums that could also be used as alternative base camps, she said, including the Walter Sisulu University Stadium and the Mthatha High School Stadium.

Source: The Herald