CAA: Stranded athletes finally hit Asaba

Chaos almost marred the opening ceremony of the 2018 African Senior Athletics Championships holding in Asaba, Delta State as over 300 athletes were stranded after failing to get connecting flights to the host city.
Athletes from more than 50 countries are competing at the 21st African Senior Athletics Championships which kicked off yesterday.
Due to this problem the organizers were forced to cancel day –one of the competitions programme for round one (1) of the 100m events, Men and Women and the 10000m Men final event.
The rest of the programmes were rescheduled to sit into the remaining four days.
Nigeria for only the second time is hosting the Championships since its inception in 1979.
Asaba, the Delta State capital is hosting the stadium at the newly renovated and renamed Stephen Keshi Stadium.
Though hundreds of the athletes from over 12 countries were initially left stranded due to lack of local connecting flights to Asaba but they later made it to the competition venue ahead of the opening ceremony after some intervention by the federal government.
Arrangements were made for chartered flights straight to Asaba and other connecting flights to Benin from where they will take a short trip to the host city.
More than 300 athletes from Uganda, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Morocco etc, slept at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday nights after failing to get the chartered and connecting flights.
Even when a chartered flight later became available, it couldn’t take off from Lagos because it was dark already and the airport in Asaba was unlit Leading in the last set of athletes to the Delta State Capital was former World Champion in the Javelin Event, Julius Yego.
In a statement issued by Olukayode Thomas, Head of Media and Publicity for the African Championships, Yego who came in with Team Kenya said they were happy to finally be on the ground to compete with the rest of the continent.
While admitting that the past days had been hectic for Team Kenya and some few other countries, Yego who is one of the top names at this year’s championship said they would have to catch their breath fast and get ready for action.
Despite the glitches in their travel schedule, Team Kenya remains resolute in their plan to conquer the continent in Asaba.
Speaking on arrival at the Asaba Airport, the Leader for Team, Peter Mutai said they have gotten behind them their delayed travel to Asaba and are now focus on winning as many medals as possible.
“We are glad we are here now, as I said when we came for the DRM meeting we are coming to win as many medals as possible.
Despite the hiccups here and there which of course it happens; especially with the number of people coming into Nigeria at the same time we are still focused on taking all the medals.
This is a big team from Kenya, with almost 65 athletes and we are focused on what we came here to do.” Mutai stated Aside from Team Kenya, the remaining batches of athletes from Egypt, Cameroon, Sierra Leone, South Sudan among others all arrived on Wednesday.
The Asaba 2018 is a record-breaking event as 52 countries will be on parade for the next five days in the newly completed Stephen Keshi Stadium.