By; JACOB ONJEWU DICKSON
The Kaduna State Ministry of Sports Development has hinted that the second edition of the state’s Schools Sports Festival is expected to begin next weekend.
This was disclosed by the Director of Sports, Alhaji Yakubu Ibrahim during a meeting with zonal sports directors and top ministry staff to fine tune preparations for the sports festival.
Representing the Permanent Secretary, he said that already, they have prepared fixtures for the sports, which is expected to feature over 500 schools in the state.
“We have been given directives to start the competition immediately schools resumes.
“By next week Saturday, we will start the second edition of the schools sports festival,” he assured.
According to him, they intended to have six events this time, against the four held in the first edition.
He said the events to be held are however, limited to four, which are; football, volleyball, handball and athletics.
“We limited the events because we have so many activities coming up within this period, including the National Youth Games (NYG) and the Kaduna State Sports Festival,” he said.
He explained that school sports revitalisation is one of the core mandates of the ministry given by the Kaduna State Government.
“This is one of the mandates given by his Excellency, the Kaduna State Governor, Malam Nasir el-Rufai to the ministry. We would have done second edition last year, but COVID-19 prevented it,” he informed.
He was optimistic that this year, more schools are expected to feature.
“We have 12 educational zones. Last time we had 500 secondary schools that participated in 2019. This time, we will have more than that,” he said.
“The 2019 schools sports united so many of the participants, who at the end when they were seperating, were even shedding tears as a result of bonding they had during the games,” he said.
The meeting had in attendance representatives from all the 12 educational zones in the state.
