Pretoria - The Magnificent Friday campaign has been launched to mobilise South Africans and boost support for the country's national cricket, rugby and netball World Cup squads.
The country's citizens are urged to wear their favourite team's jersey every Friday as well as participate in the numerous activities which have been planned for every Friday leading up to the respective World Cup tournaments.
The 2011 Cricket World Cup will start next month. It will take place in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, while the Rugby World Cup will kick-off in September in New Zealand and the Netball World Championship will be held in Singapore.
"Every Friday is going to be a rocking Friday ... every Friday will be magnificent. Through this campaign, we are building a movement of excellence and success stories," Sport and Recreation Minister Fikile Mbalula said at the launch of the campaign on Friday.
Mbalula said the launch at Church Square in Pretoria, which was broadcast live on SABC 2's Morning Live programme, was a "bang" of a success.
"The response this morning from South Africans was fantastic. We want to make things happen in the area of sports in this country, we want people to understand that we are alive, vibrant and we rock," he said.
Next Friday, the Magnificent Friday campaign will be taken to Park Station in Johannesburg.
"Through this campaign, we want our people to rally behind our national teams, but we are also deepening nation building and we want our people to demonstrate passion for their various sporting codes," he said.
Mbalula said Magnificent Friday would kick off at his department with staff members wearing the three national team's jerseys. "Throughout the campaign, we will be leading from the front with the Department of Arts and Culture."
The minister added that he expected players to reciprocate by demonstrating their fighting spirit on the field and to "make the nation proud".
Mbalula announced that next Wednesday, he will take the selected Proteas World Cup players to meet President Jacob Zuma at the Union Buildings.
