Ghana to host international table tennis events in April

Fifteen years after hosting International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) major tournament in Africa, Ghana has affirmed its readiness to stage the World Junior Circuit (WJC) as well as the African Junior and Cadet Championship (AJCC) in April, 2019.

The WJC is one of the ITTF junior circuits, where players across the globe amass points to qualify for the end-of-the-year World Junior Finals, while the AJCC is Africa’s qualifiers for the World Junior Championship as well as a platform to select African team for the World Cadet Challenge.

Ghana last hosted the AJCC in 2004 and this year the WJC holds on April 1 to 5 while the AJCC takes place on April 7 to 13.

Ghana’s Minister of Youth and Sports, Isaac Asiamah told the delegation of African Table Tennis Federation (ATTF) led by its President, Khaled El-Salhy that the country is willing to restore its table tennis lost glory with the staging of the tournaments, which he said will help to unearth players that will represent Ghana at the 2023 African Games to be hosted by the West African nation.

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“We are grateful to ITTF and ATTF for choosing Ghana as host of these important competitions and for us; we are excited that this is in line with our ideals of growing all sports from grassroots levels. We have been working hard to revive our school sports because we know we have the potential to be among the best in sports,” Asiamah told ITTF Africa media.

“I am also using this opportunity to charge the Ghana Table Tennis Association (GTTA) to focus on schools across the country to be able to discover new talents that will make our country proud at the 2023 African Games which we are hosting.

“We are ready to host the world and Africa in April and all arrangement in terms of security, accommodation and transportation will be addressed. We are also grateful to ITTF for deciding to provide table tennis equipment which has already been shipped to Ghana for the tournaments.

“For us, we want to use sports as a tool for job creation and that is why we want to develop others sports and not focusing on football. I must also let you know that table tennis is one of our priorities sports that we intend to use to create jobs for our youths. I must also commend the leadership role showed by Mawuko Afadzinu and we want to assure him our support.”

Meanwhile, the ATTF team is on a two-day inspection of facilities and hotels for the AWC and AJCC holding on April 1 to 13 in Accra.

 

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