NSC takes over bilateral chairmanship

THE Namibia Sports Commission (NSC) in December took over the chairmanship of an agreement from its Botswana counterpart.

The NSC entered into an agreement with the Botswana National Sports Commission (BNSC) in 2022, looking into sport development and sport implementation programmes in the two countries.

Speaking to Desert Radio recently, NSC chief administrator Freddy Mwiya said: “We are happy that for the past two years under the chairmanship of Tuelo Serufho the chairmanship moved to Namibia in December.

“There are some programmes we have already agreed on in terms of implementation, starting in 2024 for the next two years.”
He added: “It is a four-year programme whereby after the four years we are going to do the final review of the activities and see how best to be able to adjust our programme.”

Mwiya said it involves an exchange programme between the member states, and that eight sport codes from Namibia and Botswana have already been identified in the countries’ quest to improve the competitiveness of these codes.

“We talk about cooperative advantages between the two member states, looking at each other’s strengths and weaknesses and exchanging in terms of the sport programmes.”

Mwiya said the agreement does not only address athletes’s issues, but looks at programmes that would capacitate coaches and exchange expertise.

It further looks at how the staff members of the two national sport regulatory bodies can benefit from the agreement. “ . . . so we are able to learn about various practices in Botswana and vice versa,” he said.

“We need to build and capacitate our athletes so we become very competitive nations when it comes to international competitions.”
Namibia taking over the chairmanship means programmes identified for 2024 must take shape, however, the calendar is yet to be endorsed by the boards of the two entities.

“At the technocrat level what we have looked at already is the All Africa Games (AAG) pencilled from 8 to 23 March in Ghana. Looking at which plans we are going to put in place to ensure our athletes are well prepared,” Mwiya said.

“As you know we started already with preparations for the AAG in April last year when we sent our judo people, athletes, karate people and boxers to Botswana while the swimming team had their training camp in Angola.”

TRAINING CAMP

He said both commissions agreed there is a need for Team Namibia and Team Botswana to have a training camp at the end of January or early February.

Mwiya said invitations have been extended to their Zambian counterpart, which are yet to be accepted.

“The training camp for our athletes is very important, and when we travel to Ghana our teams will be well prepared for the games.”
He said before the continental event it is important for both Namibia and Botswana to have mini- sport competitions heading into the actual Africa competition in Ghana.

Mwiya said 2024 has many international competitions, most importantly the multi-disciplinary sport events starting with the AAG.

“We have the Olympic Games and the Paralympic Games in France and resources are truly needed. I can assure you we are not going to sleep, but will work around the clock with our federations and athletes to have success,” he said.