THE contractor handling the comprehensive rehabilitation of the main pitch of the National Stadium, Abuja, Julius Berger, would complete the job as scheduled, the National Sports Commission’s Director of Facilities, Ibrahim Gusau, has said.

Gusau told journalists at the weekend that the first phase of the work, which includes removal and replacement of the topsoil, and planting the approved specie of grass, has been completed, adding, “where we are at present is the nurturing of the grass and this will terminate on August 15 of this year.

“The pitch would be ready for light use from August 15 and we will observe it for two weeks. After that, the pitch can be used regularly for football and other sporting activities.”

On plans to regularly maintain the stadium, Shehu said the NSC had an arrangement with the contractor to maintain the stadium for six months after hand over to the commission, adding that the commission had in place systems to ensure that the stadium was well maintained all year round.

“The problem we had was that the power cable used to power electricity to the stadium was vandalised. Without electricity we could not use the sprinklers to wet the grass. Now we have put systems in place to check all that. We now have water tanker for the manual watering of the grass.”

Shehu also assured that the NSC had perfected plans to put the stadium to active use throughout the year.