Oceania says 2018 CWG vote not a done deal

Commonwealth delegates from Oceania have added their support to the momentum behind Sri Lanka’s bid to host the 2018 Commonwealth Games.

Having visited ‘the island jewel of the Indian Ocean’ last week, representatives from Oceania countries have joined a growing list of those backing Hambantota 2018.  

Despite reports in July suggesting they had agreed long ago in October 2010 to vote as a block for the other bidding city, Australia’s Gold Coast, an ‘excellent and competitive’ bid has given them ample food for thought.

Graham Osborne, representing Papua New Guinea, summed up the sentiment when he declared: “I think you will end up getting a few more votes than you think you might get.”

Niko Palamo of Samoa said: “Coming here has changed what we know about Sri Lanka and what we hear about Sri Lanka… A lot of the developing countries have already hosted the Games three or four times.  And so for hosting (the Games) to them it’s another event.  But it’s like Sri Lanka is representing the other 60 developing countries who haven’t hosted the Games so far.”

Australia (1938, 1962, 1982, 2006) and Canada (1930, 1954, 1978, 1994) have hosted the Games four times; New Zealand (1950, 1974, 1990) three times; England (1934, 2002) and Scotland (1970, 1986) twice; and Wales (1958), Jamaica (1966), Malaysia (1998) and India (2010) once. With Scotland hosting Glasgow 2014, a Hambantota 2018 Games will install Sri Lanka as the 10th country in a list that would have added three ‘new’ hosts in two decades.

Bruce Farara, CGF Vice President who joined the delegation, added: “They are two very different bids… here the concept around the sports village is an excellent concept; it’s not yet built but it will be by 2016 (two years ahead of the Games).  It’s a very competitive bid.  It has its own assets and strengths… It’s going to be a very interesting competition between Australia and Sri Lanka.”

In its 144-page report on the two bidding cities, the CGF Evaluation Commission describes Hambantota 2018 as one of ‘the most compact Commonwealth Games concept designs ever developed’.

The bid is unique in that all but three of the competition venues are in a single cluster – the Games Park – which will also house the Games Village and training venues for most sports.   It means that the majority of athletes will travel no more than 1km from the Games Village to their respective competition or training venue.  

In 2018 the cluster will also be just 13km from the new Hambantota International Airport and well served by a new road and rail network.

On seeing a large-scale model of the futuristic development – already under construction – Jonathan Snell from Norfolk Island, commented: “I think you (Sri Lanka) have a fantastic opportunity to make a wonderful sporting complex down south, which I’m sure you will achieve.  As for my personal view, the plans we saw, the hospitality and the bid document that we’ve read, you have a very sound bid as far as I’m concerned and I think it will go very well.”

Rosie Blake, representing the Cook Islands, added: “I’m sure that by the time your sports complex is finished, it will be a showcase for the world.  So I hope they (the Commonwealth countries) get behind Sri Lanka and give their support… I think you have a lot to offer.”

Hambantota 2018 has impressed many with the calibre of its ‘life-changing’ bid, dubbed so because of the myriad benefits it promises the unified nation and its proud population.  

Described as ‘visionary, exciting and unique’ by the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) Evaluation Commission, it has since wowed ‘inward missions’ from the Caribbean, Africa and Europe.  Next week Hambantota 2018 will look to secure the valuable support of its friends from Asia, who form the last inward mission from 7-10 October.  

There will then be just one month until the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) chooses the host city at its general assembly in St Kitts and Nevis on 11 November 2011.