Ben Efe
6 January 2012
Cross River governor, Liyel Imoke has expressed satisfaction with the progress made by the State’s sponsored grassroots athletics development programme.
The programme, which is part of governor Imoke’s human capacity building agenda has seen Cross River dominating grassroots sports as demonstrated at the last National School Sports Festival held last November in Calabar. Consultant to the programme, Bruce Ijirigho disclosed during a chat in Lagos that so far the efforts of governor Imoke to transform Cross River through sports and education was yielding result and it was a pleasant development to stake holders in the state.
“We are doing excellently well with the programme and the governor is pleased with what we are doing,” Ijirigho said. He added that Imoke was doing the most reasonable thing in a country were youth development has been relegation to the back stage.
“In Nigeria today, it is only Imoke that is doing capacity building for the youths. All the potential athletes that we have identified in the State are not only been trained to excel in track and field, they are also being given quality education to prepare them for life after sports,” added the former Nigerian international
Already an athlete Euphemia Edem has already won scholarship to study in the University of Arizona. Five others have already written aptitude test to study in some foreign universities, while fourteen of them have gained direct admission to study in the University of Calabar.
“Imoke has displayed the political will for development of sports, which by extension creates a better future for the youths,” said the Cross River director of sports Jude Amadi
AllAfrica – All the Time