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More fears over Rio Olympics as facilities are not ready

Apart from health fears from the Zika virus and security threat, uncompleted facilities as dealt a major blow in the run up to the 2016 Rio Olympics scheduled to kick off 9 days from now in Brazil.

As the World looks forward to the opening ceremony on Friday, August 5, 2016, reports emanating from Brazil shows that the country is far from ready.

Late preparation has always been the nature of major events such as the World Cup and the Olympics, with hosts catching up even in the dying minutes. The Rio Olympics could take a different dimension as most stadiums and facilities are far from being completed.

According to a report by Daily Mail, the situation might be really bad and should call for panic.

Facilities and Stadiums

According to the Daily Mail, electrical cables hang from above over cracked walkways in streets leading to venues, footbridges are closed off due to unfinished cementing and key transport links are in chaos.

Cracked footpaths, collapsed drains and waters filled with garbage and smelling of raw sewage are adding to the Olympic misery.

Seating in several spectator stands have yet to be installed and some stands are propped up by scaffolding as builders carry out the work which many would have hoped would have been completed months ago.

Inside the main Olympic Park at Barra, about an hour from the center of Rio, the sound of constant drilling and banging illustrates the urgency.

Construction diggers work around the clock to prepare land around the arena where Britain’s Andy Murray will try to defend his tennis Olympic title.

Several spectator stands remain without seats installed and the skeletal stands present an eerie image. The seats, we discovered, were stacked a few hundred yards away in containers.

 

Poor Transportation to be expected

Another major blow is the uncompleted transport system, the  report continues.

Thousands of Olympic fans are expected to use the service daily to access venues at Barra, but the new train line will fall about five miles short of the Olympic Park as finance has ran out.

 Olympic fans will be frustrated to find they will be forced to wait for buses to take them onto the venues.

The subway extension is still being built and contractors are on site with diggers and other construction equipment, while traffic is diverted to allow work to continue.

When Daily Mail Online visited the Jardim Oceanico station, which was meant to be finished last year, dozens of workers were beneath the streets drilling and installing panels.

The subway extension was due to be open and running months ago, but officials now say it will be in operation from August 1, four days before the Games.

It links Ipanema and Copacabana beach areas to Barra Olympic Park.

Only event ticket holders, athletes and media covering the Games will be allowed to use the link.

Locals expressed fears that sufficient  time will have been allowed for safety tests and runs.

The escalators were covered in dust and workers were carrying out their tasks in the dark.

Across the street, the bus station where spectators will be directed to, was far from complete with heavy lifting machinery and diggers at work.

Traffic is set to be nightmare around the Olympic Park at Barra where motorists will have a single lane to enter and leave the area.

The second lane has been commandeered and turned into an ‘Olympic Rio 2016’ route with promises that athletes will need only 10 minutes to reach their events from the village.

Brazilians are Disappointed

One local resident Christina Silva, 25, told the Daily mail she had tentatively welcomed the Olympics, but had since changed her stance.

Hector Siltar, 44, surveyed the Olympic Park, in an interview with the Daily Mail he said; “We the Brazilian public didn’t want the games initially and now they have not even finished the buildings for it.

“We cannot afford all this work and all the more money that is being spent on it now.’

Another local Julianne Estervez , 32, was quoted as saying: “These Olympics are for tourists only and not the people of Brazil. We do not have money to spend on our own transport, homes and it is being wasted.

 “It is insulting and embarrassing that first they take the money from public funds and then are in a panic to finish the facilities.”

Brazil is undergoing its worst economic crisis since 1930 with the economy, according to the World Bank, said to have shrunk by 3.7 percent in 2015 and 2.5 percent this year. Rio’s Olympic committee plans to have spent around $9.7 billion by the time the games begin on August 5 with the Opening Ceremony at the Maracana Stadium, the Daily Mail reported.

  • Olalekan Olonilua for encomium.ng
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