South Africa Could Bid to Host 2020 Olympics

The head of South African organizers for next year's World Cup thinks a successful tournament could lead to the Olympics being hosted on that continent for the first time in 2020.

Workers celebrate their achievement of one million disabling injury-free hours worked on the site of Soccer City stadium in Johannesburg, South Africa, Wednesday Oct. 21, 2009. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)

(AP)

"The IOC decided to give South America its first Olympics, so the only continent now without an Olympics is the African continent, and therefore I think it's something that the IOC certainly will have to begin to think about," organizing committee chief executive officer Danny Jordaan told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Speaking after a meeting with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Jordaan said he could envision Johannesburg, Cape Town or Durban bidding along with Egypt for the 2020 Games. The IOC's 2011 session will be held in Durban, and Jordaan believes those meetings could serve as a springboard.

The IOC voted Oct. 2 to hold the Olympics in South America for the first time, awarding the 2016 Games to Rio de Janeiro.

Since the end of apartheid and the first elections with universal suffrage in 1994, South Africa hosted the Rugby World Cup in 1995 and soccer's African Cup of Nations the following year, and it co-hosted the Cricket World Cup in 2003. Next year's World Cup is soccer's first in Africa.

FIFA is projecting record revenue for the 2010 World Cup, with Jordaan saying commercial partners will generate $3.2 billion.

"The argument was that any World Cup on the African continent will lead to huge financial losses. Therefore, Africa must wait," Jordaan told a reception at South Africa's U.N. consulate. "This event, because of television, is actually without boundaries and without borders. And so you can return the value of the investment in New York and Miami and London and Paris, and all over the world.

"If we dismiss the argument for the World Cup, we've dismissed it also for the Olympics."

Jordaan hopes the secretary-general attends the tournament.

"He must not only come to the continent when there is war, when he wants to talk about Darfur," he said. "He must come to Africa when Africa celebrates, when Africa excels. When there is good news he must always be there."