Cape Town - The cabinet has turned down a request by the SA
Sports Federation for the country to bid to host the 2020 Olympic Games,
spokesperson Jimmy Manyi said on Thursday.
It instead recommended that South Africa focus attention on
consolidating the gains made from the 2010 Fifa World Cup.
Manyi said that the cabinet had also decided that the
country should concentrate on the delivery of basic services to all South
Africans.
"I think the cost of the bid would have been about $50m and you know how many RDP houses we could build with that," he said.
The cabinet also repeated South Africa's stance that the next MD of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) should be from a developing country, but did not discuss any candidate names.
Manyi said that no names were discussed at all. Former finance minister Trevor Manuel, who is now Minister in the Presidency, has been tipped as a possible contender.