Bitter aftertaste for disappointed volunteers who expected more

[caption id="attachment_35473" align="alignright" width="200"] ERROL HEYNES[/caption]

MISLEADING information, disappointment and regret are what pain 2010 Fifa World Cup volunteers from around Nelson Mandela Bay who say they had expected much more from the soccer spectacle.

Applications for 2010 volunteers started flooding in well before the World Cup, with 4337 people registered in the city by August 2009.

Of the thousands, 350 made the cut by March 2010 and almost immediately started with their training, in three phases – generic Fifa training, job-specific training and customer care. A further 400 volunteers were recruited by the transport sector to assist with the transport operational plan.

The first group of 350 volunteers received certificates after completing customer care and computer literacy courses.

This led them to believe they would be actively involved and placed in permanent jobs. This, however, was not the case, with most of the volunteers simply being paid for work they did during the tournament.

Volunteers such as taxi driver Bukhosi Masengu said they were forgotten afterwards. - Tremaine van Aardt and Riaan Marias