Abuja (Core Reporters) The Chairman National Sports Commission (NSC) Mallam Shehu Dikko has advocated the use of sports to curb youth restiveness in Nigeria.
He said this on Thursday in Abuja when he played host to the Crown Prince of Benin Kingdom Prince Ezelekhae Ewuare.
The fomer second vice president of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) said, “The energy of the youths needs to be channeled towards doing more positive things and sports will do exactly that.”
Dikko observed that sports is not all about participation and medals. Adding that sports is a veritable tool to solve youths’ restiveness. “All these issues of cultism and violence will be tackled when the youths are provided avenues to burn their energy through sports. The security agencies had statistics to support the fact that when we played night games in the NPFL those days, crime rate was reduced in the society.”
To boost grassroots sports development, Dikko reiterated that school sports will be revived at all levels.
“We plan to have centers of excellence from the primary school up to the university levels, so when we discover a six-year-old who is good, we take him to a specific primary school and later follow him up to specific secondary schools and universities. These schools will be supported with the necessary facilities and well-trained coaches”, he added.
Earlier, Prince Ewuare had pointed out that he had established eight gyms across Edo in a bid to boost fitness and grassroots development of sports. While pointing out the importance of sports in curbing cultism in the state and beyond, he appealed for the Commission’s support in actualizing his lofty goals for sports at the grassroots.
Dikko assured him of the Commission’s support. In Dikko’s opinion, the involvement of royalty in sports will help to take the vision and mission of the Commission down to the grassroots.
“We will set up a small team here (NSC) to upscale what you are doing. We have experts here who will give appropriate advice and guidance in the short, medium and long-term”, he concluded.
Highpoint of the visit was the presentation of the Benin bronze head to the NSC helmsman.
