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 fortune of the swimmers around and boost them to win laurels in the fast approaching National Sports Festival in Delta State.
Reacting after been inaugurated by the Oyo State Commissioner for Youths and Sport, Seun Fakorede at the Lekan Salami Sport Complex Ibadan Dr. Akande urged the parents to eschew water phobia which always responsible for debarring their wards to taking part in swimming, describing swimming as one of sport that has a great health benefits to people of all ages.
“We shall work hard to motivate our swimmers to win medals for us get 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 that most team sports in the major competitions like NSF of Olympics and that is why we urging government to provide good facilities and enabling environment to compliments the efforts of the aquatic association in discovering the budding talents for swimming sport, as we are going to unleash their potential, and their potential will be their credential that will make them essential and influential in life”, said Akande who is also a life coach & career builder, certified e-campaigner and social media expert.
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 taken over and revive to generate income to maintain it and make them suitable for their athletes to use for training until government complete its own at Lekan Salami Stadium.
