Air Seychelles will operate a special charter flight this Saturday December 3 to take the majority of the Seychellois delegation to Mauritius for the 12th Commission de La Jeunesse et de Sports de l’Océan Indien (CJSOI) games.
This agreement was inked in a short ceremony at the Air Seychelles headquarters, Pointe Larue between the principal secretary for youth and sports Ralph Jean-Louis, and Air Seychelles’ chief executive Sandy Benoiton.
A total of 196 members make up Team Seychelles consisting of athletes, coaches, ‘volet jeunesse’ participants, officials, experts and the Minister for Youth, Sports and Family Marie-Celine Zialor who also holds the CJSOI president position.
With the national airline’s Airbus A320-200 neo passenger capacity of 168, Team Seychelles will depart on three separate flights during this week. The first cohort departed yesterday (commercial flight) and consisted of two experts, National Sports Council chief executive Jean Larue, Seychelles National Youth Council chief executive Penny Belmont, head of delegation (HOD) Alain Alcindor, deputy HOD Josette Cadence, the local CJSOI secretariat and the sailing team. The second cohort will leave on December 1 (commercial flight) followed by the chartered flight this Saturday.
Set to kick off on December 4, the youth exchange and sports competition will see Seychelles go up against the six other CJSOI member states namely Comoros, Djibouti, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mayotte and Réunion in disciplines including athletics, beach handball, boxing, futsal, weightlifting, swimming, petanque, tennis, table tennis and sailing. New to the games chart is ‘e-sports’ where participants will compete in an online Fifa match on a PlayStation. Sports aside, young people will also participate in youth dialogues, a fair for young entrepreneurs and cultural performances.
The competition will run until December 11 after which Air Seychelles will bring the team back home on a charter flight scheduled to operate from Mauritius to Seychelles on December 14.
Also onboard this flight back home will be the CJSOI flag which will be handed over during the closing ceremony to Seychelles as the next host country.
To recall, a send-off ceremony was held on Tuesday November 22 for Team Seychelles at the International Conference Centre (ICCS) in Victoria where Minister Zialor called for discipline by athletes and accompanying officials, the importance of family support as well as bringing the medal home, especially the gold.
Source: Seychelles Nation