Africa-Press – Tanzania. TANZANIA Olympic Games bound team must continue to keep shape as the athletes wait for the government’s directives on Covid- 19 vaccination.
The Tanzania Olympic Committee (TOC) announced last week that they are still waiting for the government’s directive on the fate of local athletes who are required to take Covid-19 vaccination before being cleared to travel to Tokyo, Japan in July this year for the summer Olympic Games.
All the athletes, lined up for the Games, are obliged to attend Covid-19 vaccination programme as it was directed by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which coordinates and supervises the quadrennial Games.
As the team still wait for the government directives and other instructions, athletes must continue to keep themselves in shape by training hard to ensure that they are ready for the quadrennial Games, in case everything is cleared. So far, three athletes have already qualified for the Olympic Games to be staged in Tokyo.
Marathoner Gabriel Geay became the third Tanzanian to qualify after attaining the mark in Rome, Italy over the weekend.
In the qualifying series event, Tanzania fielded only two marathoners — Geay and Natalie Sulle. The event attracted over 200 runners from different countries.
Geay finished sixth with a timing of 2:04:55, an improvement of three minutes from his previous race record. His finishing time has therefore, enabled him to qualify for the Tokyo Games.
Other local athletes who have qualified for the quadrennial Games so far are Alphonce Simbu and Failuna Abdi Matanga.
As a nation, we are pleased to learn that the trio will travel to Vienna, Austria to test their mettle in a marathon this Sunday.
While Simbu and Abdi will be participating only to test their mettle since they have already qualified Natalie Sulle will be seeking for his qualification bid.
However, as they train and seek qualification, Tanzanian athletes must continue to take precautions against the pandemic.
In fact, Covid-19 is still threatening, and this is why we caution all sportsmen and women to continue observing safety directives in this hard time.
We are obliged to caution sports personalities to be fully involved since they fit everywhere in the fight against coronavirus scare as they are among the victims of the virus scourge.
We conclude by thanking the government and sports bodies for realising the danger of Covid-19 and for joining a campaign to fight the further spread of deadly virus to keep Tanzanians safe
