NAN-S-7
Sports
By Adedeji Egbebi
Ikere (Ekiti State), Nov. 18, 2016, (NAN) An Ikere- Ekiti-born Philanthropist, Lucas Ijasan, on Friday advised youths in the Ekiti State to always participate in sports for their wellbeing and to be lucratively engaged.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Ijasan gave the advise during the annual athletic competition, tagged “5th Ijasan Memorial Athletics Competition’’ in Ikere-Ekiti.
The championships are held to honour the philanthropist’s late father for his contributions to promoting grassroots sports in Ekiti.
Ijasan advised the youth, especially those from his home town to be actively involved in the various sports.
“Participation of youths in sports is very important because that is the only way we can discover sports talents.
“Personally, I volunteered to be sponsoring this programme annually in order to encourage the youth and help them to discover their talents,’’ he said.
Earlier, the organiser of the event, Ayodeji Olowolafe, said the athletics competition had been a talent discovery programme of the state sports council.
“The competition’s major objectives are to discover talents who will represent the state and the country in athletics.
“The state sports council is in support of the championships with the intention of promoting the discovered talents,’’ he said.
Olowolafe urged parents to always encourage their children to participate actively in sports because it was lucrative and profitable.
NAN reports that 20 secondary schools in Ikere-Ekiti participated in the athletics competition.
The participants competed in 12 sports, including 100m, 200m, 400m, 800m, 1,500m, 4x100m and 4x400m.
Others are Javelin, Discus, Shot Put, High Jump and Long Jump.
The first, second and third winners of the events were giving prizes, while some of the athletics coaches from the sports council would further train the discovered athletes. (NAN)
DJ/PDE
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(Edited by Peter Ejiofor)