Botswana, Lesotho and even Mauritius get ready to welcome football fans
It’s not just South Africa that is preparing to welcome thousands of football fans next year – neighbouring countries as far-flung as Mauritius are preparing to host visitors to the 2010 FIFA World Cup
South Africa’s Rustenburg stadium is just 150 kilometres from Botswana. Mbombela stadium in Nelspruit lies just an hour drive from the Mozambican border. Namibia can easily be reached by car from Cape Town and from Bloemfontein you can hop across the border into Swaziland or Lesotho.
“We are expecting to attract a lot of tourists from Bloemfontein,” Tebello Thoola from Lesotho Tourism told Southern Africa Direct at this year’s Indaba travel trade show. “The strategy is to divert people who are in South Africa for 2010 to come to Lesotho and experience our world of culture.”
In Botswana top-end hotels and tour operators are putting together special packages for 2010, hoping that people will stay there and fly to the match venue for the game. “There is not going to be enough accommodation in South Africa and it is a very short distance from Gabarone, the capital, to various stadiums in South Africa,” says Dawn Parr from Botswana Tourism.
FIFA, MATCH and South Africa are supporting these efforts to make it a truly African World Cup and governments from the various countries are putting special visa regulations in place to facilitate travel. Didi Moyle from South Africa Tourism points out that during the 2006 World Cup fans from the Netherlands would travel to Germany for the day and that there is really no difference.
FIFA has already secured some 4 000 rooms outside South Africa with 3 200 on the island of Mauritius - a four-and-a-half hour flight from Johannesburg. Mauritius joins Botswana, Mozambique, Namibia and Swaziland as official accommodation providers to the World Cup
Mauritius' vice prime minister Xavier Luc Duval said at this year’s Indaba that the government and the people of Mauritius were "very excited to become an integral part of the 2010 Fifa World Cup.
"The excellent quality of our accommodation, our picturesque environment and wonderful beaches, together with the warm and inviting hospitality of the Mauritian people, will give an added experience to the fans," Duval said.
“The Southern African countries in the accommodation team have the unique chance to showcase fans from all over the world during the four weeks between 11 June and 11 July 2010 the splendid and diverse landscapes and the incredible hospitality the region has to offer,” said FIFA Secretary General Jérôme Valcke at Indaba.
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