Man Jose Kayima
On March 24th, the Uganda Cranes suffered a 1-0 defeat to Tanzania in the 2023 Africa cup of nations qualifier.
The Cranes hosted the game at Canal Authority Stadium, Ismailia in Egypt due to the ban on the standards of the stadiums in country.
The Speaker of Parliament Anita Among ordered the Minister of State for Sports, Peter Ogwang to apologize to the country, on the floor of Parliament for letting Uganda Cranes play in Egypt instead of playing at home.
“Tell us the reason why we should not hold you people accountable for a nugatory expenditure of paying money to play a game in Egypt. That is a nugatory expenditure which money you should have used to play from here. You should have invested that money to have a game here to finish whatever is here. Can you apologize to this country?” Ms Among said during plenary sitting on Thursday afternoon.
In response, Mr Ogwang said, “Madam Speaker, I thank you for those good questions. To begin with, I did regret on behalf of the Ministry of Education and Sports as to why we found ourselves in Egypt. Madam Speaker, on behalf of the Ministry of Education and Sports, I apologize to the country for having made Uganda Cranes go and play in Egypt.”
Uganda Cranes on March 25 lost to Tanzania by a goal to nil in their third game of the 2023 Africa cup of nation’s qualifiers. Fufa chose to take Uganda Cranes 2023 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier against Tanzania to Egypt after falling short of options.
The federation had hoped to use the St. Mary’s stadium in Kitende but the stadium failed the strict Caf test following an inspection in December last year.
Uganda’s Mandela National Stadium, Namboole currently under renovation with the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) engineering brigade taking charge of the process.
Minister Ogwang confirmed that the renovation process is expected to concluded before Uganda Cranes game against Algeria in June.
Uganda is currently joint second with Tanzania in Group F of the Qualification phase with 4 points they have garnered in four games.
