National Olympics Committee of Kenya will award 10 more athletes and six teams with scholarships ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
This will bring the number of individual athletes beneficiaries to 18. Eight sportsmen and women had been granted the scholarships early this month
.Francis Mutuku, the Nock acting secretary general, said the Olympic organisation has finalised processing the 10 new scholarships and will be unveiling the athletes and teams in few days.
"The eight have already commenced their preparation as we speak and immediately the rest are unveiled, they will embark on the training," said the secretary general.
The Nock kick-started the Tokyo 2020 program by facilitating the qualification of teams and awarding scholarships to athletes. The eight include Brian Mutua (table tennis), Gulraaj Sehmi (shooting), Emmanuel Korir (athletics), Mercy Joseph (badminton) and Danilo Rosafio (swimming). Others are Carlos Atieno (judo), Webster Lukose (weightlifting) and Mathayo Mahabila (wrestling).
Meanwhile, Nock has partnered with an authorised Tokyo 2020 Olympics ticket re-seller Kingdom Sports Group, currently targeting Africa and Asia markets.
The group, based in Sydney, Australia has been authorised by all national committees and endorsed by the International Olympic Committee.
"We will be delivering packages with tickets for all clients from Kenya who wish to travel to the 2020 Olympic Games. We try to assist the Nocs in the allocation of tickets and hotel accommodation and put together affordable packages for spectators to be able to attend the games," said Daniel Beniston who promised to deliver incredible packages to Kenyans.
The IOC will allocate a percentage of spectator space to each national Olympic committee and has dictated a fraction of the proceeds from the ticket sales to be ploughed back into the NOCs.The number of seats allocated to each NOC follows IOC's policy which is not in the public hence Kenyans will have to be patient.
However, Mutuku said in the case Kenya's demand for space is high, Nock will negotiate with Kingdom Sports Group to transfer more tickets meant for other countries whose demand is low.
"Kenyans should take advantage of the information available between now and June to start preparing to purchase the tickets. Demand for spectator space at the Tokyo 2020 Games will be the highest in the several past Olympic events," he added.
