UPDATE: City disputes Alex stadium claims
JOBURG – The City of Joburg has denied ever talking to Alex's football administrators about building a new stadium in the township.
The City of Joburg has denied ever being in talks with the Alexandra Northrand Local Football Association (LFA) about the possibility of building a new, additional stadium in the township.
Spokesperson Nthatisi Modingoane said, “The City wishes to place on record that there has never been a discussion about building a new stadium in Alexandra. All the discussions the City had with the LFA pertain to the upgrade of the current stadium, such that it is compliant with both the Premier Soccer League and South African Football Association requirements so that tournaments can be held there.
“There has been no intention or plan to build a new stadium. However, the City did explore different funding models to assist with alleviating the challenge of [the] lack of facilities in the area. Hence the City of Joburg’s community development department entered into an agreement with the Safa development agency to build on No 1 Square Ground, which was a facility that was dilapidated and burnt down and unplayable,” he said.
He added that the people who made this claim are the same people who made allegations about the City’s spending on the renovation the Alexandra Stadium some time ago.
“The City of Joburg can therefore not be associated with claims made about discussions on course to build a stadium,” he said.
He was reacting to claims by LFA secretary-general Mafika Morajane, who said they had engaged in talks with the City on the possibility of building a new stadium in Alex. Morajane said there was a need for an additional stadium because of the growing number of teams whose fixtures no longer allowed for all the children to play every week.
“Some of our children go for two weeks or more without kicking a ball as the LFA tries its utmost best to accommodate all the teams and all the children by staggering the fixture arrangement, hence we have held talks with the City to possibly build us an additional stadium,” Morajane said.
Read: Stadium revamp pinned on new City admin
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