Dear Editor,

Qatar was voted to host the FIFA Football World Cup in 2022. Congratulations are in order. For such a small nation of less than two million people, this is worthy of tremendous praise. Qatar has a GDP/per capita income among the highest in the world, and with their earnings from oil, they have the financial means to pull off a spectacular World Cup.

This win for Qatar, however, presents a potential benefit for Jamaica if we play our cards right. How so, you may ask?

The Qataris, with all their wealth, plan to spend US$5 billion on the construction of nine new stadiums to host matches. In their planning, they realised that they have neither the population nor the sporting capacity to support the proper utilisation of the facilities after the tournament ends. As such, the Qataris plan to disassemble their glamorous, first-class stadiums and ship them abroad for reassembly in countries in the developing world as a goodwill gesture to spread the “beautiful game”.

I would think it prudent for the Jamaica Football Federation and the government (through the ministries of sports, foreign affairs and tourism) to begin negotiations from now with the Qataris to get one of those stadiums to replace our National Stadium.

I think most Jamaicans would dearly love to receive a brand new stadium. Sadly, our population has outgrown the National Stadium at Independence Park, and its renovations are costly. Neither can we afford the resources to build a new one. A donation of a new stadium from Doha to Kingston would serve us very well.

I strongly suggest to Captain Horace Burrell and other JFF officials to start drawing up a master plan this weekend for discussions with the Qatar Football Federation and let us be one of the fortunate countries to receive a new stadium. Let us not wait for other requests to come in and we have been left out.

Kavon Fiennes

kfiennes@gmail.com