Bold plans to ensure the success of Mandela Bay’s R2,2-billion soccer stadium beyond next year’s Fifa World Cup were spelt out on Monday by the head of the company appointed to run the facility.

The first task would be to achieve the “critical mass” of earning R20-million a year to ensure its upkeep without ratepayers having to carry the burden again.

Access Facilities and Leisure Management managing director Rian Oberholzer said the provincial government, municipality and businesses would have to work together to take annual earnings beyond this.

They would have to ensure a Super rugby franchise was granted to Southern Kings, which should be based at the stadium.

“SA Rugby cannot renege on its promises that the Eastern Cape will get a Super 15 franchise,” he said.

At the same time, every effort should be made and resources utilised to make sure Bay United returned to the Professional Soccer League Premiership, Oberholzer told a business indaba in Port Elizabeth.

Oberholzer, one of the country’s most successful executives in stadium and sports event management, said this would enable the stadium to make a profit.

He told the “Future Perfecting Indaba” it had been built to host more than just one sport or event and using it to its full potential was imperative.

“I don’t think that everybody expects or thinks at this stage it could ever pay for itself, if you take into account the building cost R2,2-billion.

The stadium will never make that amount. The challenge for us as operators is to ensure that it doesn’t cost any more to the city and the ratepayers.”

Not only were there fixed operating costs like salaries, maintenance, electricity, cleaning and security, but also variable specific expenses like operational costs, medical assistance and event preparations.

“You see too often that people do not have a maintenance plan in place, and you then see how quickly stadiums deteriorate.

I was at Ellis Park two weeks ago and it was quite a shock for me to see how badly the stadium has been maintained, and the lot of money we have to spend to bring it back to its glory days.”

Oberholzer, director of the 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa and Ellis Park manager, assured business leaders this would not happen to the Bay stadium.

“We made the decision along with the city to ensure that the stadium has a maintenance plan in place, so that (it) stays at the level it is now, at all times.”

A major portion of the R20-million required could be raised through selling the naming rights for between R8-million to R12-million, while other major income sources would be anchor tenants like sports teams, events such as concerts, sponsors, a concession store, 45 private suites for rent and advertisement boards.

At least 22 events a year would have to be held.