AUSC Region 5 Cancels Activities
Calistus Kolantsho | Monday March 23, 2020 15:04
The only event that has been left is the Regional Annual Sports Awards (RASA) scheduled May in Eswatini. The awards would proceed if the situation abates.
AUSC Region 5 chief executive officer, Stanley Mutoya said activities that have been postponed are the 2020 games joint chefs de mission, confederations, regional organising committee and local organising committee meetings that were scheduled for Lesotho from March 22-28 in Maseru.
“The desk officers, women in sport and sport for people with disabilities committees meetings as well as sports development and finance and marketing commission meetings including secretariat meetings that had all been scheduled for the period between April 1 and 6 have been indefinitely postponed. The executive committee meeting scheduled for May 5 and 6 in Maputo, Mozambique as well as the proposed regional marathon tentatively slated for May 16 in South Africa have also been cancelled and new dates would be announced in due course,” he said.
Mutoya said the COVID 19 has shocked the world and poses a serious threat to the sporting industry and AUSC Region 5 has made a conscious decision and paid attention to the World Health Organisation (WHO) and several governments calls to preserve the sanctity of life under the circumstances.
“It is unfortunate that we have had to cancel all our events and activities due to the coronavirus. We have not cancelled RASA for now with the hope that the current situation will have improved by end of May,” he said.
The AUSC Region staff is working from home. “We have resorted to telecommuting in order to allow staff to work from home and minimise interacting in public through other means that may expose them to possible infection in the event of any cases,” Mutoya said.
Meanwhile, AUSC Region 5 office recently donated sports equipment to Ramotswa Junior Secondary School. The projects and marketing manager for AUSC Region 5, Siyabonga Sangweni told Monitor Sport that the donation was a way of reaching out to the communities in remote and rural areas as part of the Sports For All initiative in partnership with The Association for International Sport for All (TAFISA). “Out of 465 students, 33 students have disabilities. The school has been struggling to fulfil its mandate of giving lessons in physical education for learners with disability due to limited resources,” he said.
Sangweni said for a learner with disabilities, the curriculum requires for practicals to be conducted as part of the assessment. He added that the school had difficulties in achieving that requirement.