NBA, NGOs collaborate to improve basketball in Nigeria
Emmanuel Alfred
There is an ongoing initiative between the National Basketball Association and some Non-Governmental Organizations to spot and develop players in the sport.
The programme which is tagged, ‘The Power Forward Programme’ has been in existence since 2013 with huge successes being recorded as about one hundred and fifty thousand young Nigerians have benefitted from the initiative.
However, it was suspended due to the breakout of the COVID-19 pandemic and other logistical issues but it is making a sensational return with the initiative seeking to cover sports, education and health.
The programme which made a return on Thursday, June 9, 2022 at the Government Secondary School, Wuse, Abuja saw leading oil conglomerate, ExxonMobil- a big sponsor use the Power Forward Programme to eradicate malaria in Nigeria.
The Vice President of NBA Africa, Gbemisola Abudu who organized the event which saw about two hundred students participating said, ‘the initiative gives young Nigerians a rare opportunity to learn about the fundamentals of basketball and also equip them with life skills that are transformational to their lives. This programme helps us identify talents and incorporate them into the adequate programmes’.
Also speaking, a representative of ExxonMobil Foundation, Ogey Udiagha siad, ‘the Power Forward Programme aims at supporting the Federal Government of Nigeria and other Agencies in combating malaria because malaria is responsible for a lot of deaths in the country. We have made a commitment of about twenty billion naira in the past twenty years towards eradicating malaria’.
