BONA 2027 GAINS MOMENTUM
The Botswana and Namibia Bid Committee for the 36th Africa Cup of Nations ‘BONA 2027’ convened its 4th inperson meeting in Windhoek on Monday and shared some update on the progress.
The deliberations included progress and plans on stakeholder engagement, procurement, planned competitions between Botswana and Namibia as well as sign off training venues.
The committee also announced BONA 2027 ambassadors from the two countries who are expected to play a key role and travel across the continent, attend matches and help with the lobbying of votes to ensure the two countries win the bid.
Each country chose four (4) representative and Botswana has chosen former Zebras former stars and The Mares’ players, amongst them Diphetogo “Dipsy” Selolwane and Jerome ‘The Big Animal’ Ramatlhakwana who were part of the Zebras team which qualified for the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations in Equatorial Guinea.
After leading The Mares to their maiden appearance at the Women Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) finals held in Morocco earlier this year, the captain, Bonang ‘Bebeto’ Mosetlha has also been selected as one of the ambassadors alongside former Prisons XI, Kefilwe ‘Fifi’ Modisaotsile.
When announcing the ambassadors of the campaign, the BID-Committee Chairperson, Ashford Mamelodi stated that they are already preparing to issue the above mentioned individuals with appointment letters after thumbsup from the relevant Ministries.
“What we are intending to do in not so distant future is to call them for a workshop so that they are very clear in terms of the dos’ and don’ts,” Mamelodi added.
He further shared that the BID budget has been completed and relevant Ministries of the two (2) countries, Botswana and Namibia, are currently appreciating the document while the BID-Committee awaits their response.
The Botswana National Sports Commission (BNSC) Chief Executive Officer, Tuelo Serufho, who is also the Communication Manager of the BIDCommittee, gave updates pertaining to issues of procurement and stated that a procurement exercise is a rigorous process.
“The process has taken a bit of time because we needed to ensure that the law is followed to the letter and along the way we have had challenges and setbacks that led to us taking the time we have taken. “We are just about to launch a process to identify a bid consultant, the way it has been structured will cover areas of marketing of the BID-Book and other services that are required to ensure that ultimately we will have a compelling bid to submit on behalf of the government of Botswana and Namibia,” Serufho said.
This past week, a team of delegates from Morrocco visited Botswana Football Association to handover their BID-Book for the 2025 AFCON finals, despite the gulf in class in terms of infrastructural developments between Botswana and Morocco, Mamelodi highlighted that the Morrocco documents will help to guide them on what needs to be done.
CAF are yet to open bidding rights to hosts the 2027 AFCON finals but Mamelodi has emphasized the need to work around the clock to ensure that once expression of interest to host is announced the two countries should be in a position to submit a satisfying BID-documents.
A game between the two nations is being planned which will be used as a campaign strategy to continue promoting the intentions of the two countries to host the AFCON finals come 2027.