Hambantota bank on life-changing bid

KUALA LUMPUR, May 11 (Reuters) - Sri Lankans will enjoy an “extraordinary life-changing situation” should the port city of Hambantota, ravaged by the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, win the bid to host the 2018 Commonwealth Games, Ajith Nivard Cabraal has told Reuters.

The governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka was speaking in Kuala Lumpur after handing over the city’s bid book and delivering a speech to Commonwealth Games officials in Malaysia.

The Sri Lankans are up against Australia’s Gold Coast to host the Games, which occur every four years, featuring up to 17 sports for athletes from more than 70 countries of former British colonies.

“It means an extraordinary life changing situation for our country,” Cabraal said on Wednesday when asked why the city had made their surprise bid.

“I think in 1998 when they (Malaysia) hosted the Games they were just a country that was maturing but it made a huge change and was a huge plus for them, so I think this will do the same for Sri Lanka.”

Forty thousand Sri Lankans were killed by the devastating tsunami which struck the country’s south coast, where Hambantota is situated.

Since then, the town has witnessed a large number of redevelopment projects with a new port almost complete, a state of the art airport able to welcome the largest aircraft in the world and new roads and railways lines under construction.

“This (bid) will show and convince ourselves that we have moved on from that (tsunami).

“It was a devastating experience for us, 40,000 of our people died and the coastline was devastated but we have rebuilt it, and if you go to any part of the south or east you will not see any sign of the tsunami anymore.

Cabraal said that the majority of the work in Hambantota, which hosted matches at the recent cricket World Cup, was to be completed regardless of the bid and could be an inspiration to other smaller countries in the Commonwealth who were thinking of bidding in future.

Should the Gold Coast be successful with their bid, it would be the fifth time Australia has hosted the Games with only nine countries having the honour in the event’s 81-year history.

“I think it needs to change,” Cabraal said of numbers.

“It (Hambantota winning) will also encourage many other countries to come up and say ‘we would like to do it ourselves too’ and that will give an extraordinary impetus to the Commonwealth Games itself.”

Cabraal was confident of securing all the necessary funding for the $1.8 billion project and that the government have guaranteed support to pick up the surplus should costs overrun.

“I think we will be able to raise the funds without too much difficulty, even in the worst of time, projects that will yield good results and will give good long term legacies there is plenty of funding available.

“It is only a question of how you market it and how you show the benefits of a particular situation and if you can convince people and the people can see that these are going to make some major differences for them and some major revenue streams for them then they will be people who (commit) even in the worst of (financial) times.”

The slim Cabraal, receiving praise for his speech from Commonwealth Games members as he discussed his team’s bid with Reuters, believed hosting the event would generate a boom in sport in Sri Lanka similar to that witnessed when the country became a full test cricket playing nation.

“The young people will get energised, the young people will think that they will also have the opportunity of performing in front of their own crowds and will give the incentive to get more active.

“It made an extraordinary change once we got (cricket) test status (in 1981) and 15 years later we won the World Cup, so that shows there was potential but you needed to have a reason to harness it or bring it together, channel it.

“The Commonwealth Games will give us the opportunity if we do get it.”

Gold Coast can fix Delhi

hangover - bid chief

KUALA LUMPUR, May 11 (Reuters) - Awarding Australia’s Gold Coast the right to host the 2018 Commonwealth Games would help the event recover the ground lost after last year’s chaotic Delhi event, bid CEO Mark Peters told Reuters on Wednesday.

Peters was speaking after the Gold Coast handed over its bid book to Commonwealth Games officials in Kuala Lumpur and delivered a presentation focusing on the region’s existing facilities and popularity as a tourism destination.

Gold Coast is competing against an ambitious bid from the Sri Lankan port-city of Hambantota, which is banking on its huge redevelopment work being enough to convince officials to give the south Asian island the event for the first time.

“Australians love the Games and for us it is a very important part of our sports system,” Peters told Reuters in the Malaysian capital.

“It’s not about who deserves to get them, it’s about who can run a good Games, who can actually recover a little bit of the lost ground from Delhi.”

Pictures of dirty rooms in the athletes’ village and a collapsed bridge by the main stadium remain the overriding images of October’s Delhi Games despite a late push by organisers to ensure the events ran smoothly.

Many top athletes such as Jamaica’s multiple Olympic sprint champion Usain Bolt skipped the Games because the timing did not fit their schedules, while other athletes stayed away because of security concerns which proved unfounded.

“They (the athletes) want a bit of excitement about where they come and if we are truly about the friendly games that’s what the destination should be up to,” Peters said after announcing they would stage the Games in April.

“If your home country knows your athletes are going to be successful then there is a certain enthusiasm for the Games and we want to make sure that territories and Commonwealth nations do actually send their best athletes and do have a great time.”

Peters was confident the region had strong backing from private Australian companies to host the event -- held every four years for more than 70 countries mostly of the former British Empire.

“Just as our Australian population loves the Games, our companies have supported the Games as well,” he said.

“(2006 hosts) Melbourne ran at a profit, it’s a well-learned fact, and we have learnt so much from Melbourne and there is a lot of that expertise available in Australia that we will be utilising if we win the Games.

“We are confident that the corporate sector will also rally and a lot of our big companies like (mining firm) Rio Tinto will be in a lot of the Commonwealth countries so we see a lot of benefits and we think there will be a good revenue generated to go with the costs of running the Games.”

Peters explained that the region, which welcomes more than 11 million tourists a year, was keen to use the Games to help develop the area further.

“Gold Coast is a major regional town and very much had an economy based on tourism,” he said.

“It’s looking to diversify its base so by bringing the Games we will see more investment in transport, infrastructure and roads etc which will just enhance what we have.”

Should the Gold Coast be successful with its bid it would mean Australia hosting the event for the fifth time with Hambantota arguing the event should go to new territories instead.

“Last time we looked Hambantota was part of Asia who hosted the Games in 1998 (Malaysia) and again in 2010 (India),” Peters quipped with a smile.

Peters’ thoughts were echoed by Gold Coast mayor and former Commonwealth Games medal-winning middle-distance runner Ron Clarke.

“We don’t have to build much more, Sri Lanka is really, sort of ‘trust me we are going to build all this’ but there is nothing there,” Clarke told Reuters before flying back to Australia. “Our location and people and enthusiasm and size is all perfect so I can’t see how we can miss if it’s just through a judgment. If there are other things that come into it, well then.”