Andy Esiet, Calabar
Sports development in Cross River state will soon be taken as buisness hence from June 2023 the state will commence an aggressive grassroots sports from primary to the tertiary level with great incentives to investors.
The governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Bassey Otu gave this promise on Tuesday when he had a “Sports Stakeholders Engagement” at the
Offiong Edem, Table Tennis Academy of the U. J. Esuene stadium, Calabar to hear from the various stakeholders challenges facing sports in the state and the way forward.
He said, “We are going to take sports seriously, develop a robust sports development programme even though current state of the State’s economy really affected sports but will look at sports as a buisness” .
He said that crime is high because the youths are wasted “but we will develop them, develop new Rovers and Pelicans stars and other sports…we are going to start catch them young right from the local governments, taking sports from primary, secondary to the university level.
“We will develop our players to develop our Gross Domestic Product (GDP), train and give them grants and Cross River will not be the same again as we will bring in the private sector into the sports sector and give them tax insensitive. What we are building is a stakeholders government involving all sectors coming out with a policy to move the state forward.
To achieve all these, the governorship hopeful said, he will adopt the National Sports Industry Policy ( NSIP) signed by President Mohammed Buhari last year as the document is aimed at ensuring that sports play a prominent role as an instrument of national unity and cohesion.
Some of the policy document include, tax exemption and rebate for a period of five years for investor’s in the value chain of sports, land provision and waiver for certain fees on land meant for sports, single digit loan interest rate for cooperate organization and private individuals investing in sports value chain among others and “we will run a robust business model that will turn around our economy within the next few months in office” .
Earlier the various stakeholders which included, Rovers FC management, Pelican Stars, Cross River State Football Association, Captain of Team Cross River, Patience Okon, Chairman of Sports Writers Association (SWAN) Coaches, Ex-Rovers players, Cub Owners , Commissioner for Sports, the Chairman Sports Commission, Mr. Emmanuel Elom and others decried the current state of sports in the state.
They various stakeholders who endorsed Senator Otu for the Saturday governorship election said “Sports is dead in Cross River and appealed for his urgent to revive it soon as he assumes office God’s willing” .
