Durban puts hand up for 2020

It’s official — Durban was the only South African city to submit a bid to possibly host the 2020 Olympic Games.

South Africa’s Olympic governing body SASCOC invited four cities to apply for the hosting rights — Cape Town, Durban, Port Elizabeth and Johannesburg.

But it was confirmed by SASCOC’s CEO Tubby Reddy at the national Olympic governing body’s Annual General Meeting at the weekend that of those four cities only the coastal city of Durban submitted a bid.

The bidding process is now finalised as far as SASCOC are concerned and the decision on whether a formal bid will be submitted to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) for consideration now rests with the national government.

Extensive investigation and feasibility studies will now be done as national and local government attempt to get buy-in for the bid.

After the IOC Session to be hosted in Durban in August, 2011, the IOC will then send a formal invitation for countries to submit bids for the right to host the Summer Games.

The IOC executive board then conducts its own exhaustive investigations before the host for the 2020 Olympics is finally announced at the IOC Session in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 2013.