Cape Town will get a new stadium for the 2010 World Cup

Essop Pahad, a cabinet minister and member of South Africa's World Cup Local Organising Committee (LOC), said the decision to build a new stadium had been made following talks with Fifa.

South Africa had proposed refurbishing the Newlands rugby stadium, but capacity problems would have relegated Cape Town to hosting the early rounds rather than the more prestigious semi-finals.

Provincial leader Ephrahim Rasool said the 68,000 stadium would be part of an inner city park and could be the 'deposit' on a future bid for the Olympic Games to be held in Cape Town.

The final is scheduled to take place at the refurbished Soccer City stadium in Johannesburg, which will also host other matches at Ellis Park.

The other host cities are: Pretoria; Durban on the Indian Ocean Coast; Port Elizabeth on the South Coast; Polokwane in the northern province of Limpopo near Zimbabwe; Nelspruit in the province of Mpumalanga near the Kruger National Park, the central city of Bloemfontein and Rustenberg, near the famed Sun City resort.

The final choice of venues was announced Monday by South Africa's deputy sports minister Gert Oosthuizen.

Organizing officials decided to drop proposals for venues in the diamond town of Kimberley and the mining centre of Orkney following a series of inspections by Fifa.