Th e Minister of Youth and Sports, Barrister Solomon Dalung, has poured encomiums on SportsMark Award which will soon be launch in the country . Dalung praised the initiator of the Award Gboyega Okegbenro for the laudable initiatives and innovations particularly as it concerns youths and heroes and heroines of yesteryears in the country’s sports industry. He challenged them not to allow detractors to deter and derail the objectives and mission of the project adding the SportsMark must develop thick skin in the cause of achieving its objectives.
Th e Minister commended Okegbenro for ploughing back his 34 years of experience in sports business dating back to his secondary school and NUGA Games for the up and coming generation. Responding, the CEO of SportsMark. He made the remarks in Abuja National Stadium when Okegbenro and his team paid a courtesy call on the Minster. Okegbenro said the one of the reasons they paid the visit to Dalung was to espouse the ideal of the sports annual awards which would be in various categories. He said the project was target towards the encouragement, enablement and rewarding the athletes. Okegbenro added the award which will be a unique and fi rst class will be on the same level as the BBC, Laurels and FIFA awards. “It ‘ll not only capture just one sport but multi sports and designed to add value, grant training grants to athletes, give rewards to those that have contributed one way or the other to sports development in the country,” he said. We intend enable athletes, mentor them and ensure that their contributions do not go unrewarded especially when they are old and cannot no longer fend for themselves,” he explained. SportsMark also intend to provide foreign scholarship for youngsters who distinguish themselves in schools sports as contacts will be made with the Nigeria Schools Sports Federation towards a good working relationship. Th e award he said would hold later on in the year, tentatively November 2017.
