By a Staff Reporter
Kathmandu – The Ninth National Games is unlikely to be held in the scheduled date. A meeting of the Council of Ministers on April 13 had decided to organize the mega event in Pokhara from June 5 to 11. However, the government has not taken any decision even though it seems unlikely that the games will be held on time.
The number of sports discipline for the national games have been already decided while the logo, mascot and the slogan for the games have been made public. However, no other concrete steps have been taken besides that. This is almost certain to defer the games.
It has been learnt that the process of making preparations for the games have been halted mainly due to the delay in approval of the tournament directives by the Ministry of Finance. However, National Sports Council (NOC) officials haven’t made any official announcement regarding this issue.
A source at the sports governing body informed that the process of preparation for the games has been stalled after the finance ministry disapproved the NSC’s proposal to revise the public procurement act to 7 days instead of 35 days especially for the games.
The participating teams are also confused as the NSC has not issued any notice regarding the games.
“Even the district-level selection hasn’t completed yet. As per the schedule, we have less than three weeks left,” a provincial sports official said on condition of anonymity, adding, “the Ninth National Games cannot be held in scheduled date in the current situation. However, no official announcement has been made so far. He get queries from each district and we haven’t been able to give then satisfactory answer.”
A board meeting of the NSC on April 22 had decided to include 38 sports disciplines – 36 competitive events and 2 demonstration games – in the Ninth National Games. The NSC unveiled the logo, mascot and slogan for the games on May 7.
The NSC has fixed the deadline for registration of teams within May 24. However, it is not possible to register the participating teams within May 24 as the district-level selection is not yet over.
The NSC had earlier informed that a total of 11 teams including 7 provinces, three departmental teams and one team representing NRNs would compete in the event.
