GTA and GFA partner DC United to launch Capital City Africa Cup

The Ghana Tourism Authority and Ghana Football Association have partnered Washington-based soccer club DC United to launch the Capital City Africa Cup where each year, the winner of Ghana’s Premier League will play DC United.

The announcement was made during the Ghana Business and Investment Summit that took place at the Ghana Embassy in DC on 19th September, 2022 with Washington DC being one of the key markets promoting travel and tourism to Ghana.

With a vibrant Ghanaian and African community and a large population of African Americans visiting the continent of Africa, this collaboration through soccer is intended to bring the communities together while promoting the spirit of welcome to Ghana and Africa.

“This initiative will not only help bridge the gap between the people of Ghana and the Washington DC but it will lay the foundation for a strong alliance through the exchange of tourism, culture and the promotion of soccer,” said Mark Addo, Vice President of GFA

“The Ghana FA is excited about this new alliance with DC United, and we look forward to collaborating on many fronts to promote soccer in our domains” he added.

Mr. Addo also spoke on how the FA is investing in youth football so as to develop a strong base for the future of Ghana Soccer.

“We’ve now been focusing on youth development by promoting youth football,” he said.

“This has been a passion in Ghana for many years but lacked support through official structures,” he added.

He indicated that the FA has made significant strides in securing major sponsorship to make the development of youth soccer a reality.

“We look forward to you coming to Ghana, whether it’s for pleasure or investment to take the time to visit our stadiums and watch our teams.”

In the United States, soccer is one of the fastest growing sports played by young people, as estimated in 2020 that 17.8 million Americans played soccer.

“As many of you all know, the power of soccer is immense. It brings people together, and especially wherever you find a ball you find young people.” said Shanell Mosely, Director of Community Relations for DC United.

“We are honoured to be presenting you with our DC United jerseys. We look forward to this long relationship ahead.”

She presented the home jersey for DC United to Mark Addo who also presented a jersey from Ghana’s Black Stars in return.

Maryland, Virginia and Washington DC, are some of the most affluent and educated metropolitan areas in the United States and house some of the highly regarded Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU), i.e. Howard University and Bowie University.

Paxton Baker, CEO PKB Enterprises, said the idea behind launching the Capital City Africa Cup is to “establish the city of Washington DC as the anchor to showcase talent coming out of Africa in arts, culture and soccer.”

He explained that the initial game for the Capital City Africa Cup will be in March 2023 and will be an annual event taking place at Audi Field in Washington DC.

Mr. Baker indicated that, the week of the game will be dubbed “Ghana Week” in Washington DC which will feature arts, food fairs and culture prior to the commencement of the game between winners of Ghana Premier League and DC United..

In attendance was the Minister of Tourism Arts and Culture, Hon. Ibrahim Awal, the CEOs of GTA and GIPC, Akwasi Agyeman and Yoofi Grant respectively.