June 11, 2008	Wednesday	Jamadi-us-Sani 06, 1429

JOHANNESBURG, June 10: Two years ahead of the 2010 World Cup, organisers in South Africa are facing soaring costs for building stadiums in addition to worries over xenophobic violence, power shortages and rampant crime.

Organising committee chief executive officer Danny Jordaan said he expected the final cost for the construction and renovation of 10 venues for the finals to finish well above the current budget of 9.8 billion rand ($1.24 billion).

“It will probably be over 10 billion rand,” Jordaan said, adding that the financing of the venues remained a challenge.

“We are dealing with now with final costs of the stadiums, which are soaring as a result of the downturn in the world economy and rising fuel prices,” he added.

Jordaan said there was still potential for cost overruns on some major remaining tenders by the cities hosting games although 94 percent of items had been procured.

“We don’t know what the final impact of the economic downturn will be on our costs. It’s unfortunately a moving target,” he said.

South African inflation hit a 5-1/2 year high of 10.4 percent in April. Rising fuel prices and likely electricity price hikes to address a dire power crisis mean it could go higher.

Jordaan said recent attacks on African immigrants, accused by poor South Africans of taking jobs and fuelling a crime wave, also had a potentially negative impact on the tournament. At least 62 people were killed and nearly 100,000 displaced.

“It was a setback for the image of South Africa but it was behaviour that was un-South African,” Jordaan said.

Despite his concerns, Jordaan promised “a wonderful event”, which will begin at Johannesburg’s 94,000-seater Soccer City Stadium on June 11, 2010.

Initial estimates for stadium construction and renovation were set at just under 6 billion rand while a further 13.6 billion rand is being invested in infrastructure directly related to the tournament.—Reuters