São Paulo – Despite having been defeated in its attempt to host the Olympic Games in 2016 and 2020, the government of Qatar is going to return to investing on taking the competition to the capital city, Doha, in 2024. To convince representatives of the International Olympic Committee that the country has chances to host the event, Qatar should take to the Olympics in London, to begin in July, an office of the National Olympic Committee. In the English capital city, the Arab country will show the qualities and attractions that Doha has to receive the competition.
“The National Olympic Committee space will show at the London games the development of Qatar not only in sports, but also in other areas. We are going to show the world what we are doing in sectors like health and education We are also going to show our culture and tradition and the efforts we are making for a cleaner environment,” said the secretary general of the Olympic Committee of Qatar, Saoud Bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, according to information disclosed on the site of Qatari newspaper The Peninsula and of news agency EFE.
The country has enrolled Doha to host the 2016 games, but abandoned the dispute before the final. Rio de Janeiro won. Doha returned to investing in hosting the 2020 games, but was disqualified by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in the last phase, one month ago, as was Baku (in Azerbaijan). The finalists for this edition of the games are Tokyo (Japan), Istanbul (Turkey) and Madrid (Spain). The winner will be announced in September 2013, in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Thani stated that hosting Olympics is part of the Qatar National Vision 2030 project. This plan forecasts improvement in basic education, in health service, greater environmental preservation and improvement in the quality of life of the population, which already has the greatest per capita income in the world. Part of the plan is to have hosted the Olympic Games by then. “Hosting the Olympics is the dream of any city. The same is true about us,”
he said.
To the secretary general of the National Olympic Committee, Doha may organize the event. He mentions examples like the fact that the city and Qatar is about to receive competitions of several modalities in coming years. Still in 2012, the country will host the world short-pool swimming championship (25 metres). In 2015 it will receive the world handball championship and, in 2022, the Fifa World Cup. The country has also agreed to host the mountain bike championships in 2016. “Among our objectives is making Qatar into a sports centre,” said Thani.
*Translated by Mark Ament
