Red House wins first Greenwich School’s inter-house competition

Red House has won the fifth First Greenwich Schools’ inter-house sports competition held at the Airforce Base, Shasha, Lagos. With 20 gold, 23 silver and 16 bronze medals, Red House beat Green House, which had gold, 16 silver and 22 bronze medals to the second position, while Blue House got 17 gold, 19 silver and 18 bronze medals to occupy the third position.

Among the events at the competition watched by parents, students and invited guests were taekwondo, 100m race, 75m race, 50m race, filling the bottle, sack race and slipper race.

A primary six pupil, Adegoke Aderogba, of Green House won the best sports boy award.

Speaking at the occasion, the school’s Proprietress, who doubles as Director of Sports, Mrs. Folashade Ogunkolati, described Nigeria as a lucky country endowed with different talents, which under the normal circumstance, should rank the nation as one of the frontline countries in sports.

She blamed the country’s failure to leverage on the enormous talents on the nonchallant attitude of officials in charge of sports, as well as absence of necessary infrastructure.

“The importance and inclusion of sports in the school curriculum is an avenue to keep the children fit.”

Children in Nigeria are talented, gifted, skillful and have what it takes to compete with their peers in the western world.

“When a child is physically fit, he will also be mentally alert to cope with academic challenges. Sports also promotes unity, team spirit, honesty and transparency, among children,” she said.

Ogunkolati called on government to create sports centres in every locality for children to hone their skills, saying that it would help to reduce the number of miscreants on the streets and youths going into crimes.

She also underscored the importance of balancing sports with academics.

Also speaking at the event, Chairman of the occasion, Tony Obihai, urged government to invest in sports instead of the window dressing type of support and politics currently bedeviling sports, which is one of the identities of the country.

He added that the country would reap from the country’s many talented youths when government provides enabling environment to boost sports.