Cross River Requires About N1b to complete Indoor Sports Hall — Orok Duke
FeaturedSports October 15, 2017 Dianabasi Effiong
Orok Duke
From Dianabasi Effiong
The abandoned indoor sports hall of the U.J. Esuene stadium, Calabar, Cross River state will need over N1 billion to be completed.
However this figure is only for the completion of the oval portion of the hall with roofing while the other attachments for other facilities that collapsed need to be scrapped.
The Chairman, the State Sports Commission, Otuekong Orok Duke, disclosed this at weekend in an interview with some newsmen after conducting them round the newly completed ultra modern indoor table tennis hall at the stadium.
He said that before the Gov. Ben Ayade’s administration came on board “as much as over $14 million was spent on the multi purpose indoor sports hall that was to accommodate may sports including table tennis yet it was abandoned”.
He stated that “most of the facilities have already been paid for but the contractors have gang up against the state demanding for extra money at the cost of the new exchange rate.
“Since Governor Ayade came into office no single contractor has returned to site, this is a gang up. When they drew the contract it was clear in the contract terms that the government will not pay them any form of variation.
“By my estimation, if we have N1 billion we will finish the whole structure that is the oval after scrapping others. So for them (the contractors) asking for N3 billion is not realistic.
“The indoor sports hall has been paid for and most of the abandoned facilities they (past government) had already paid over 70 per cent by previous government. Like the swimming pool they had paid 100 per cent and the balance was N34million and Governor Ayade has approved that they should pay”.
On his effort in bringing sports back, he said, “when I came and saw was an indoor uncompleted sports complex. We have other facilities that were introduced but not completed, hence we built the indoor table tennis hall with no government in put but the cost they gave me was N220 million but we have done that hall under N25 million. We monitored it directly”.
“The hall has capacity to accommodate six tables at a go and before now the U.J.Esuene stadium had no hall for table tennis as it relied on the squash hall which could only take one table for training.
“We used to train at Army Eburutu barracks for boxing but they have stopped us and that is why we are trying to create a place for boxing and other facilities for ourselves.
“We are doing weight lifting, wrestling, and badminton. We are building a 15×15 wrestling hall and judo. The mats are arriving from China soon and Ayade is to commission the hall and others.
“We have 43 sports and we are doing it one after the other gradually we will get there. Now we have finish table tennis and we can host table tennis. We will finish wrestling and judo and face badminton.
“With the facilities we are putting life is returning to the stadium as you can see every evening the children come here to train on various sports and we facilitate their transport,” Duke said.
Meanwhile, the Akwa Ibom State Governor, Mr. Udom Emmanuel has redeemed his pledge of $10,000 per goal for the matches against Indomitable lions of Cameroon to the Super Eagles, even as he charged the three–time African champions to go all out for a win against Zambia on Saturday and expect ‘a handsome reward’ from him.
The governor had promised the players the sum of $10,000 for every goal, two days before their clash with the African champions, whom the Eagles walloped 4-0 in Uyo on the first day of September, before earning a 1-1 draw with the Lions in Yaounde three days later.
Zambia last tasted victory against Nigeria in a competitive football match at senior level 32 years ago.
There have been 18 matches in all, with the Eagles winning seven, Zambia winning five and six draws. But this is only the second FIFA World Cup qualifying match between the two teams, the first won by the Eagles in Ndola last year.
NIGERIA & ZAMBIA AT SENIOR LEVEL
15 July 1973: Zambia 5 Nigeria 1 – Lusaka (AFCON Qualifier)
29 July 1973: Nigeria 3 Zambia 2 – Lagos (AFCON Qualifier)
14 Feb 1976: Zambia 1 Nigeria 3 – Lusaka (Friendly)
10 Mar 1978: Zambia 0 Nigeria 0 – Accra (AFCON)
25 July 1981: Zambia 3 Nigeria 0 – Lusaka (Friendly)
13 Mar 1982: Zambia 3 Nigeria 0 – Benghazi (AFCON)
10 Aug 1985: Nigeria 0 Zambia 0 – Lagos (AFCON Qualifier)
18 Aug 1985: Zambia 1 Nigeria 0 – Lusaka (AFCON Qualifier)
12 Mar 1990: Zambia 0 Nigeria 2 – Annaba (AFCON S-F)
10 Apr 1994: Zambia 1 Nigeria 2 – Tunis (AFCON Final)
15 Dec 1997: Zambia 2 Nigeria 0 – Lusaka (Friendly)
18 Dec 1997: Zambia 0 Nigeria 0 – Kitwe (Friendly)
13 Jan 2001: Nigeria 1 Zambia 0 – Lagos (AFCON Qualifier)
24 Mar 2001: Zambia 1 Nigeria 1 – Chingola (AFCON Qualifier)
6 Jan 2010: Zambia 0 Nigeria 0 – Durban (Friendly)
25 Jan 2010: Zambia 0 Nigeria 0 (4-5 penalties) – Lubango (AFCON)
25 Jan 2013: Nigeria 1 Zambia 1 – Nelspruit (AFCON)
9 Oct 2016: Zambia 1 Nigeria 2 – Ndola (World Cup Qualifier)
7 Oct 2017 – Nigeria 1 Zambia 0 (Uyo World Cup Qualifier)
Dianabasi Effiong
