President of Confederation of African Athletics, Kal-kabe Maboun yesterday expressed his disappointment over the poor participation of spectators at the Abuja National Stadium, venue for the annual Abuja Super Grand Prix.

Speaking at a media briefing organised by the Athletics Fe-deration of Nigeria to herald the 2008 edition of the NNPC/EXXON Mobil, Maboun advi-sed that Nigeria, like other Afri-can countries should introduce musical carnival as part of acti-vities for the Grand Prix in order to attract crowd during the fies-ta.

According to Maboun, Nige-ria should strive to raise the ca-pacity of spectators at the Abu-ja Grand Prix to a reasonable le-vel, like what is obtained in Braz-zaville and Morocco.

He also advised Athletics Fe-deration of Nigeria to raise the standard of the subsequent editions of the Super Grand Prix by bringing in athletes from Carribbean, America and Europe to compete in Abuja.

"I also want to say that the Super Grand Prix in Abuja should take another step for the future; we need to attract the Carib-beans, Americans and Euro-peans to come and compete in our city here, to compete in Africa and discover Africa than to allow Africans to compete for the pride of African teams at home.

"I was in Brazzaville last month and it was successful with about 40,000 people in the stadium; and two weeks ago I was in Rabat Morocco and it was the same, more than 40,000 people were in the stadium with the best athletes coming from the world.

"It could be the same here in Abuja, we must do it, not only to invite the best athletes in the world but also to sensitise our population, the youths to come and support the competition.

"So, I am ready to do that in close collaboration with the President of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria", Maboun stated.