By Ikenna Nwokedi
Rear Admiral Festus Porbeni (Rtd), President of Nigeria Rowing, Canoe and Sailing Federation, has commended the Delta State Government for hosting a successful 21st edition of the National Sports Festival (NSF) tagged ‘Delta 2022’ and putting in place good facilities for the festival.
The former Minister of Transport made the remarks during an interview with sports writers at the venue of the Rowing and Canoe event of the just concluded 21st NSF held at Asaba, Delta State from 28th November to 10th December 2022.
Rear Admiral Porbeni stated that his dream is to ensure that rowing, canoe and sailing events stay in the national sports festival not as an option but as a regular in the biggest sporting programme in the land.
He said that his federation are making frantic efforts to ensure that it becomes a compulsory sports not just at the festival but in other sports programme in the nation.
He revealed that the sports is a gold mine that has 54 gold medals attached to it at Nigeria’s version of the olympic games.
“This sports has got lots of prospects, as you can see a total of 54 gold medals was competed for at the National Sports Festival whereas other sports like football, handball etc has just one gold medal attached to it. At the Olympics, we saw how Michael Phelps won 7 Gold medals making a huge mark.
“I am really delighted that Rowing and Canoe was part of this year’s sports festival, before now it was not known and our activities were a bit silent, I was disappointed that at the NSF held in Edo in 2021, we made frantic efforts for the event to feature to no avail”,
“However, we are making huge inroads as I have proposed the sports in Jos and other places we have body of water such as Jabi Lake in Abuja,” he said.
The former minister revealed that although the sports is an expensive one, the federation wants to collaborate with a firm known as Board Magnifa to produce rowing boards which will further amplify efforts geared towards moving the sports to the next level.
He highlighted achievements in the areas of human capital development, which saw two Nigerians featuring at London 2012 Olympics and Rio 2016 Olympics with one representing Great Britain and the other Nigeria.
The retired military officer also stated that Ayo Bello and Esther Toko are the shining lights of the sports in Nigeria and have given the nation a name at the global stage.
He stated that the federation are working towards enhancing the visibility of the two star athletes while working on developing more at the grassroots level.
He commended the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports Development for the support while calling on corporate organizations and public spirited individuals to lend support towards the growth of the sports in Nigeria.
