World Cup 2010 tickets availability. Are they enough?

African fans will be fewer in the stadiums to support their teams during the soccer World Cup in South Africa, the first ever held on African soil, the Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) announced here Monday.

In Africa, "the highest ticket buyer is Ghana with 8,700 tickets followed by Cote d’Ivoire with 6000 and Algeria with 4,300 tickets bought," FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke told reporters on the sidelines of the Indaba Tourism Fair being held in Durban until 11 May.

However, he did not give any indication on the number of tickets purchased by the three qualified African countries; Cameroon, Nigeria and the host country, South Africa.

The problems of Internet bookings, which a small part of the African population has access to, combined with too high ticket prices and expensive and impractical air transport is responsible for this low number, he said.

"To get to South Africa from Kinshasa or Lomé, one must pass through Paris," said Jerome Valcke, indicating that charter flights will be established to enable soccer fans from qualified African countries to directly fly to South Africa , where the competition will kick off within a month.

"The Algerian government will finance charter flights to take fans directly to South Africa," he said, adding that for other countries, negotiations are underway.

According to FIFA statistics, the highest ticket buyers are the Americans with 110,000 tickets reserved, followed by the British with 97,000 tickets, Australians and Germans 43,000 and 40,000 tickets respectively. The French have only reserved 4,000 tickets.