Kenya bids to host 2025 IAAF World Championships

Philip Muchiri in Doha, Qatar

Kenya has placed a bid to host the 2025 World Athletics Championships in Nairobi, an attempt that could see the country become the first African nation to stage the biennial event.

Athletics Kenya (AK) President Jackson Tuwei said Kenya tabled the bid on Thursday during the IAAF Convention where the athletics governing body also revealed details of the revamped international competition calendar to Member Federations.

“We presented our bid which was approved by the Government so that we can be considered as one of the interested countries to host the World championships in Nairobi.

I’m told Nigeria also presented their and Morocco will do so too. It’s going to be a competition  but so far no other continent has shown interest in hosting the event,” Tuwei said.

Kenya hosted the IAAF World U18 Championships in 2017 with over 800 athletes from 131 countries assembling in Nairobi for what was the final edition of the global championships for athletes in that age group.

It was hailed as the ‘best ever’ championship of its kind, posting record spectator attendances and that success played a big part as Kenya again won rights to host the 2020 World Junior Under-20 Championships.

“By hosting an outstanding final edition of the IAAF World U18 Championships last year, Nairobi demonstrated its readiness to take the next step as a championship host,” the IAAF said last year after announcing it had awarded Kenya the hosting rights.

Morocco is the only African country to have staged a leg of the Diamond League, the annual athletics series which runs from May to September around the world.

The Moroccan city Casablanca was also the last in Africa to try to stage the World Championships, having bid unsuccessfully for the 2011 event.

With the 2019 and 2021 events having been awarded to Qatar and the United States respectively, the next available championship to bid for is 2023.

But Hamad Kalkaba Malboum, the president of the Confederation of African Athletics (CAA), in an interview with BBC Sport said he had been in talks with political leaders including Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, and believes this is too early for the continent.