Daily Independent (Lagos)
Peter Edema
3 May 2011
The federal government has come up with welfare programmes aimed at safeguarding the future of Nigerian athletes.
Consequently, the government is said to ensure that athletes pursue their education up to the tertiary level by providing athletes opportunities of educating themselves to the university level.
The government has also evolved a programme of comprehensive insurance policy for all athletes during competition and also out of competition aimed at safeguarding their future.
These are some of the promises made by the Sports Minister and Chairman National Sports Commission (NSC) Professor Taoheed Adedoja, during a reception organised for the victorious Flying Eagles players and officials at the Sheraton Hotel Lagos on Monday.
“The NSC has packaged continuing education for sports people who did not finish secondary education so that they can continue to play while acquiring education.
“And for those who aspire to higher education, the same thing will happen.
The team, which won the African Youth Championship (AYC) a record sixth time in South Africa on Sunday by defeating Cameroon 3-2 in the final, were hosted to a dinner by the Lagos State government.
The government , Adedoja said, “is determined to ensure that athletes and footballers future are guaranteed” hence its desire to ensure that athletes education did not truncate at the high school level but to ensure that they can acquire university education.
This Adedoja was necessary in that after university education, they will have something to fall back on, noting that the insurance policy is to take care of unforeseen circumstances.
He also promised that the NSC has started renovating abandoned facilities across the country, adding that it has also commenced the upgrading of hostels across the country to hotels for athletes accommodation.
According to him,the National Stadium in Lagos, along with other dilapidated sporting facilities in the country will be renovated and re-opened for use in a few weeks time.
“We want to assure you that in a few weeks time, facilities like the National Stadium Surulere and others all over the country will be back working.”
“The National Stadium, for instance, has not been used in years. It will be upgraded and re-opened in a few weeks so that young people like you can have a place to express their talents again.”
He said reason for upgrading the hotels was to ensure that athletes get befitting accommodation whenever invited to national camp
“We believe that our athletes be housed in an environment conducive for training. Our facilities are not been utilised because they are not good enough for sports development. All these abandoned facilities will come back to life,” Adedoja said.
he told the players that the president, Goodluck Jonathan expects them to win the FIFA U-20 World Cup in Colombia, informing that the president is very passionate about sports.
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