African nations enter event

Press, 5 March 1988, Page 88

African nations enter event

By

KEVIN TUTTY

African nations are still entering the -World CrossCountry championships in Auckland this month, rather than withdrawing from! them as they have been! asked. [ Since January 31 — the deadline for countries to inform the organisers of their] intention to compete — a further 14 nations have; entered and four of those are African., There have been no withdrawals or threats of withdrawal, the executivedirector of the organising committee, Mr Jerry Fletcher, said yesterday. On the contrary, the 14 additional entries have taken the number of countries competing to 56, one short of the record for the championships. Mr Fletcher said that two of the African nations which made late entries, Ethiopia and Tunisia, had arrived before a call two weeks ago by the president of the African Council for Sport, Commodore Bayo Lawai, for African nations to boycott the championships. Entries from Zambia and Zaire had arrived after the call for a boycott as a protest at the inclusion of South African born Zola Budd in the British team for the championships. The African countries are not the only interesting names among the list of late entries. Also included is Antigua, a Caribbean nation, and Sweden, whose strong anti-South African views are well known. Sweden refuses to trade with South Africa and last month the New Zealand Davis Cup tennis player, David Lewis, discovered how vehemently opposed Swedes are to South Africa.

Lewis played in South Africa late last year. This was discovered by Swedish journalists during the Davis Cup tie in Sweden last month. As a result, television coverage of the doubles match in the tie, in which Lewis played, was blacked-out.

Three teams, Denmark, Finland and Fiji, have already arrived.

The 14 late entries are: Antigua, Argentina, Bulgaria, Ethiopia, Greece, Hong Kong, Iran, Israel, Poland, Sweden, Tunisia, Turkey. Zaire, Zambia.