Tanzania joins other 69 nations as the 20th edition of the Commonwealth Games gets underway with the official opening ceremony tonight at Celtic Park in Glasgow, Scotland.
About 40,000 spectators inside Celtic Park and a potential television audience of more than 1 billion will be treated to a stunning night of entertainment from Scottish icon Rod Stewart, former Britain’s Got Talent finalist Susan Boyle and Amy McDonald to name but a few.
From audacious, visual and musical performances to theatrical moments, the celebration will set the Glasgow skyline alight, according to organizers of the multi-sport festival.
The story of the Commonwealth nations will be aptly represented through the Parade of Nations, the Competitors’ Oath, and the epic finale to the Queen’s Baton Relay as it ends its 190, 000km and 288-day adventure. The action begins tomorrow with 12 sports disciplines on menu.
These are aquatics, badminton, cycling, gymnastics, hockey, judo, lawn bowls, netball, squash, table tennis, triathlon and weightlifting. Boxers and shooters go into action from Friday.
Athletics, a founding sport in Commonwealth Games, will take place between this Sunday and next Saturday, August 2 at the temporarily modified Hampden Park, Scotland’s national football stadium.
The programme will commence with the 26.2 mile marathon, which will start and finish at Glasgow Green and include numerous para-sport events throughout. Tanzania will be represented by 36 athletes, who will compete in six disciplines — boxing, athletics, cycling, judo, table tennis and swimming.
Tanzania has competed in eleven of the eighteen previous Commonwealth Games; in 1962 as Tanganyika, and from the 1966 Games as Tanzania, following the union with Zanzibar in 1964.
The country has a good record in winning medals in the Games since 1970 when legendary boxer Titus Simba won silver medal in Edinburg, Scotland, who was followed by another success in 1974 when the legendary Filbert Bayi clinched a gold medal after setting a men’s 1,500 metres world record in Christchurch, New Zealand.
At the 2006 edition staged in Melbourne, Tanzania was nineteenth in the medal tally with two medals, and was twenty-fourth in the Alltime tally of medals, with an overall total of 21 medals.
But the nation witnessed a poor performance of its athletes at the 2010 Commonwealth Games held in New Delhi, India, who returned home empty handed. As they prepare for 11 days of rigorous action, Tanzanian athletes at the 2014 Commonwealth Games know they shoulder a huge task of lifting the county’s hopes and make it proud by bringing home medals.
“Every athlete’s aim is to win a medal and that’s what we’re striving for and we believe we can do better this time round,” boxing coach Jonas Mwakipesile said prior to Team Tanzania’s departure.
His remarks were echoed by team captain Selemani Kidunda who said that Tanzanians should realize that their team is in Glasgow not on holiday but to fight for medals that will regain the country’s lost glory. “We know, we shoulder a big responsibility to bring joy to Tanzanians by coming back with medals … we’ll work to the best of our abilities and try our level best to bring happiness to this country,” he said.
Ahead of the Glasgow games, the country embarked on ‘sport diplomacy’ to enable its athletes to perform better and bring in medals from international events.
Through the programme, almost 50 athletes and 16 coaches went for training in China, Ethiopia, Turkey and New Zealand. Bidding the team farewell in Dar es Salaam early last week, President Jakaya Kikwete threw a challenge to Tanzanian athletes to return home with medals which the country has been badly missing.
Source Tanzania Daily News