From Okwe Obi, Abuja
Africa Plus Tomorrow has promised to spend $2 million on sports development in Africa, with the support of international partners.
Its President and Founder Kenneth Eze, at a press conference yesterday in Abuja, explained that the initiative was not to groom players and sell abroad, but stated that the gesture is to reduce poverty and criminality on the continent.
He said it was disheartening that Africans take the risk of traveling through the sea in search of greener pastures despite the contribution of European countries to assist indigent African countries.
Aside sports, he said the organisation would also invest in education and green energy, in no distance time.
“We are banking on our partners. Secondly, we are counting on the support of the government which they have given us already that is why we are here. Without the support we cannot come here to say we are doing anything.
“We have a lot of support all around the world. We see Africans jump into the sea to Europe.
“The European Union itself pays a lot of money to different African countries to take care of those things happening in the other side. The European Union has said instead of these people coming to Europe and we are still spending money, let us support good initiatives in Africa.
“The support is for sports in general. We are not looking at football alone. We do not have a specific numbers of Africans we want to assist. The money is meant for project that is sustainable. We are going to get the numbers as soon as we go on.
“Coming down here is to know the people we are working with. The problem we have abroad is not the money but how to spend it on existing projects,” he said.
Also, Director General of Nigeria Women Economic Development, Lugard Okonobo, explained that part of the funds would be used for physical infrastructure, human capital development and consumables.
Okonobo said: “In sports,.we have 3 key areas we will be looking at. One is the physical infrastructure. We have a lot of stadia that not befitting and are underutilized.
“Some are over stretched, some are dilapidated. We will be visiting for on-the-spot assessment. The second is the human infrastructure like training the sports enthusiasts and administrators.
“We need to build the capacity of our administrators. The third aspect is consumables like the track suits, baseball cap, racket, football, table tennis and so.”
