The minister of youth and sports development, Mr Sunday Dare, has expressed satisfaction with the level of activities at the ongoing National Sports Festival tagged ‘Delta 2022’ in Asaba, Delta State.
The Sports Minister swiftly returned to Asaba after attending the 62nd Ordinary Session of the Authority of Heads of State and Government at the start of the week.
Fielding questions from the press after another tour of various game venues, Dare stated that the Festival has lived up to billing in spite of the short span of time the Ministry and Delta State government had to plan.
“We have not been disappointed. We have seen very young athletes from virtually all the states compete in various sports, with the youngest at about eight years old. This speaks to grassroots development, a major focus of our administration. What Delta state has put together in just about a few months testifies to how well they have done.”
The minister stated that every room for improvement is being noted and the standard of the game will certainly continue to get better year on year.
“The most important thing is that we made this happen. We built up momentum in Edo State, we sustained it through Delta State and we hope that by December 10th when we announce the next hosts, we can sustain that, too.”
The National Sports Festival had suffered a six year setback between 2012-2018 when it couldn’t hold but the Sports Minister Dare says priority attention is now given to the festival, to ensure that budding talents at home do not suffer the impacts of hosting failure.
At the start of Day 6, hosts Delta State were comfortably leading the medals table with 69 gold, 33 silver and 25 bronze medals. Ogun state sat second with 10 gold, 6 silver and 9 bronze medals, while Oyo State was third with 9 gold, 10 silver and 6 bronze medals.
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