CHAN Semi-finals: Lions will never lose a match at Limbe Stadium – Southwest Governor

By Tata Mbunwe

As the Intermediate Lions plan to face Morocco at the Limbe Omnisport Stadium for the CHAN semi-finals, Southwest Governor, Bernard Okalia Bilai, has told CRTV that traditional rulers had sworn that the Lions will never lose a match in Limbe.

He said the Chiefs had dedicated the 20,000 capacity Limbe Omnisport Stadium to the Lions during its inauguration in 2016.

“This stadium has been dedicated to the Lions. The traditional rulers swore that the Lions will never lose a match here. So we are expecting the Lions to come and collect their victory to go back for the finals in Yaounde,” he said.

Amid insecurity challenges, Governor Okalia Bilai said all measures have been put in place to guarantee security, and the Lions are welcomed to the Southwest Region.

“The Southwest region is expecting the Lions to come here. The Lions are always welcomed to this region… Everything is going well. I think we have not registered any incident as far as security is concerned. We congratulate those who are contributing to fight insecurity,” Okalia said.

The Intermediate Lions defeated the Leopards of D.R. Congo in a quarter-finals match at the Japoma Stadium in Douala on Saturday, January 30 to secure a place in the semi-finals.

The match with D.R. Congo was the Lions’ first game at the Japoma Stadium ever since it was constructed.

Before the Cameroon-DR Congo game on Saturday, DRC had accused Cameroon of conspiring to eliminate them a the CHAN. This was after information was released that 13 new Coronavirus cases had been recorded in the Congolese camp, but experts later confirmed just 3 positive cases.

“Barrier measures: we can notice that everybody is wearing a mask, including you the journalists. So I think that we are succeeding to handle security measures very well and barrier measures against COVID-19,” said Southwest Governor.

The Intermediate Lions will be facing the Atlas Lions of Morocco in the semi-finals while Mali will face Guinea in the second semi-final game on Wednesday, January 3.

The two teams that emerge as finalists will wrap-up the tournament on February 7.