Official Mascot For the 17th Africa Senior Athletics Championships Unveiled

Official Mascot For the 17th Africa Senior Athletics Championships Unveiled

The official mascot for the 17th edition of the Africa Senior Athletics Championships in Nairobi, Kenya christened Shujaa (Kiswahili for Champion) has been launched. The unveiling event was presided over by the Kenyan Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Youth and Sport, James Waweru, Athletics Kenya Chairman, who is also the chairman of the Local Organising Committee (LOC) Isaiah Kiplagat, LOC's Chief Executive Officer, David Okeyo, various sub-committee heads, former five-time World Cross Country and marathon world record holder, Paul Tergat, who is the championship's ambassador.

This follows a successful bid by Kenya and a thumbs up by a delegation from the Confederation of African Athletics (CAA), after a three-day private scrutiny of facilities in place for the event. The delegation, led by retired Namibian sprint star Frankie Fredricks, concluded that Kenya was more positioned for the event than Benin who had also expressed interest to host the track and field showpiece.

The continental championships which will be held at the 35,000-seater Nyayo National Stadium in Nairobi from July 28 to August 1 expects a total of over fifty countries from Africa to participate. So far twenty-five have confirmed and have filled their list of preliminary teams with the LOC.

Meanwhile, the Outdoor Advertisers Association of Kenya (OAAK) entered into a Kshs. 7 million partnership support deal for the event with its Local Organising Committee (LOC) that will enable their members to erect Nairobi 2010 promotional material on the LOC billboards and banners without charge in the country's major towns. Strategic roads in Nairobi, Mombasa, Kiambu, Athi River and Thika are some beneficiaries of the outdoor advertisers' deal.

The event has so far attracted sponsorship from Kenya Airways (Official Carrier), National Bank (Presenting Sponsor and Official Bank), Adidas, Samsung and Safaricom (Title Sponsor). Safaricom is putting in Kshs. 20 million into the four-day event with an additional Kshs. 3 million for technical support.

According to the organizers, these championships are going to be the biggest ever with about 1,200 athletes expected to participate. The event will also provide a good ground to select the team for the Continental Championships that will be held later in September in Split, Croatia. Kenya will be fielding the highest number of athletes (164) followed by Nigeria (125) and Ethiopia (85).

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