The Acting General Manager of Ondo State Sports Council (OSSC), Evelyn Lebi on Monday resumed duties promising to revive grassroots sports will be one of her top priority.
Lebi stated this in an interview with sports writers at his office in Akure after resuming her new post as number one administrator the of the council.
Lebi’s appointment was announced through a letter signed by the Head of Service, Mr Bayo Philip earlier in January.
She was welcomed by the management and staff of the council amid funfair.
The acting GM, who appreciated the governor and the sports commissioner, assured all staff and management of the council of running an open door policy and was ready to carry everyone along in the decision making process.
Lebi said the only way to revive sports was to have more athletes, especially the younger ones from the nooks and crannies of the state and also assured that zonal offices were more involved.
The acting general manager also reiterated the importance of having more equipment for the discovery and nurturing of the athletes discovered and assured of posting more hands to the zonal offices.
“Sports is a global business now. It’s more than in the past that it used to be entertainment. Most of these youths have these talents.
“But if we don’t go there to discover and tap them, how do we build on them? So I’m ready to revive all those things, because when I was discovered, they do bring me to Akure for weekend camping.
“We cannot be doing competition for those in the Akure alone. But by sending people to the zonal offices, and we empower them, we make sure that all these things that we encourage them to stay in the zonal offices, their welfare and at least welfare too will be looked into.
“By the time we do this, staff welfare too will be looked into, by the time we encourage the coaches, they will be ready to go to schools and communities to train and discover athletes,”she said.
“My advice to everyone is to appeal to them to cooperate with me, to embrace me and to see me as their own.
“Together we can do it, I cannot do it alone. In sport development, they (coaches and athletes) are the engine room. There is no way I can work on this table without them.
“So I seek for their cooperation so that sport development will be taken to a greater height which is the policy and what the government wants
“The government has sent me here based on my experience and exposure, so that the knowledge I have, I will be able to turn around sport development in the states. So I am here to reposition and turn things around, so that we go back to our old ways of doing sports,”she said.
Lebi had served as Secretaries of Wrestling, Table Tennis, Scrabble and traditional sports associations and was also a former hockey player.
Until her appointment as the acting general manager, she was the director of sports in the state Ministry of Youth and Sports Development