Nigeria’s Southwest Basketball unveils grassroot Development Programmes

Nigeria’s South West Basketball Association has revealed a series of activities in a bid to take the sport to the next level.

The six zones were at the last Nigeria Basketball Federation (NBBF) board meeting, charged to stay alive to their duties and play active roles in grassroots development.

The South West Association made up of Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Osun, Ondo, and Ekiti States, led by representative, Olumide Oyedeji, a former captain of Nigeria’s D’Tigers, are the first to take up the challenge and set the ball rolling with the official unveiling of the Zone’s Basketball Association annual programmes and logo.

The Association rolled out a series of activities including a secondary school tournament for boys and girls, Collegiate basketball championships and a basketball league as well as development clinics for basketball officials.

The coordinator, Oyedeji said the plan was to take the game of basketball to every doorstep.

“We are going to be giving boys and girls basic skills and during this time we are going to work on developing their talents mentally, technologically, socially, emotionally, intellectually and also teach the importance of education and sports,” Oyedeji stated.

The South West Association is hitting the ground running with the activities in the lineup set to begin in earnest.

According to a member of the technical committee, Tunde Popoola, the secondary school tournament will kick off the series of events.

Popoola said “we are going to start on the 16th of this month, the dates will overlap. We are starting with Ekiti on 16-17 May, Ondo 17-18, Osun 18-19, Oyo 19-20, Ogun 20-21 and Lagos 21-22. There will be a monitoring team starting from Ekiti that will witness all the finals in the states and a date will be fixed for the finals, which will feature the finalists from each state”.

The NBBF president, Musa Kida, hailed the association for being at the forefront of the developmental strides.

“What they are doing here today, is actually fuflfilling a provision of the constitution of the Nigerian basketball federation. You expressed yourself very well when you elected Olumide to represent you. I’m happy to see that he is standing up to the challenges that you have set for him, saying he wants to be accountable to you. It is no surprise that you are the first to organize this formally, ”the NBBF President said.

Kida warned that it would not be business as usual for the various zones as they would be held accountable for activities in their zones.

He said “The constitution by which we got elected insists that we must be accountable to our congress. So it is obligatory for us to be accountable to you. Not only is there going to be a sense of coordination, but the zones are also going to be held accountable for the activities and programmes that they must purse in their own zones and be able to also bubble it up to the national for general coordination.

“So it’s a huge task, it’s not business as usual. Like I always say, it’s not the same NBBF anymore, we now have a constitution that is very strict on accountability and we intend to make sure everybody is accountable”, Kida added.

The highlight of the event was the unveiling of the new South West logo which featured an image of Oduduwa, a divine king in Yoruba land and a map of the South West region  painted in the colours of a basketball.

Confidence Okwuchi