By; AYO OJEDOKUN Lagos
The newly appointed vice chairman for the Aquatic Association of Oyo State by the government, Dr Akande Kazeem Babatunde has promised to hit the ground running by mapping out plans to turn the fortunes of the swimmers around and boost them to win laurels in the fast approaching National Sports Festival (NSF) in Delta State.
Reacting after he was inaugurated by the Oyo State Commissioner for Youth and Sports, Seun Fakorede at the Lekan Salami Sports Complex Ibadan, Dr. Akande urged the parents to eschew water phobia which is always responsible for debarring their wards from taking part in swimming, describing it as one of sports that has great health benefits to people of all ages.
“We shall work hard to motivate our swimmers to win medals for us as the festival in Delta gets underway and we are also going to produce more good swimmers for the state and by extension the country so that we can bring back the former glory of Oyo State, having good and best swimmers around.
“Swimming attracts more medals than most team sports in major competitions like NSF of Olympics and that is why we are urging government to provide good facilities and enabling environment to compliment the efforts of the aquatic association in discovering the budding talents for swimming, as we are going to unleash their potentials, and their potentials will be their credentials that will make them essential and influential in life”, Akande who is also a life coach & career builder, certified e-campaigner and social media expert, said.
Tackling the lack of facilities that is facing the aquatic sports in the state, Akande said, “to have identified many abandoned swimming pools that we can take over and revive to generate income to maintain it and make them suitable for our athletes to use for training until government completes its own at Lekan Salami Stadium”.
