By Our Correspondent

In its quest for the development of netball in the country, a Non-governmental Organisation, Community Sports and Educational Development, CSED initiative has conducted training on basic netball for Physical Education Teachers in Enugu State, South-East Nigeria.

The two-day training was held in partnership with the Enugu State Post Primary Schools Management Board (PPSMB) at the Nnamdi Azikiwe Stadium, Enugu.

The training event is part of the quest to use PROJECT 2027 to bring the game of netball to the attention of one million Nigerian school girls, before the end of the year 2027.

CSED initiative is an NGO that uses sports as a tool for promoting literacy and the social well-being of Nigeria children and youths especially the girl child and vulnerable youths.

The two-day training in Enugu is the fourth in the series of basic netball training that is aimed at educating, motivating and activating P.E. Teachers with the basic knowledge and equipment (netball balls, training bibs, finger-held whistles and netball rims) that will enable the new netball coaches to introduce the game of netball to their students and residents of their local community.

Similar netball training events have been held in Edo, Delta and Akwa Ibom States, since June 2022 when PROJECT 2027 officially started.35 P.E. Teachers and PPSMB officers drawn from various schools in Enugu and Nsukka participated in the two-day event. The participants who was made up of 29 female, and 6 male had a refreshingly different experience in learning the rules and techniques of netball.

The new netball coaches were drilled by Edema Fuludu (CSED National coordinator) and Onome Fuludu, who are certified Netball Africa coaches.The Director of Enugu State Post Primary Schools Management Board, Mrs Justina Ifeoma Onuchukwu who was part of the event organizing committee, praised the Trustee of CSED Initiative for deciding to extend their PROJECT 2027 netball training to Enugu State.

In her words: “the PPSMB Board Chairman loves sports development alongside education and that is also my goal. We hope that CSED Initiative will bring another of your Teachers capacity building training to Enugu State, again.”

She urged other sports for change NGOs to emulate CSED Initiative in supporting the Enugu State Government in building the capacity of Teachers, as the ultimate beneficiaries are going to be the students.

The participants also expressed their thanks to the Trustees of CSED Initiative for the new knowledge that they have gained; the free basic netball equipment that have been provided to their schools and hope to put them into good use in their various schools. Signed certificates of attendance were given to all the participants of the training event. 

At the end of the training event, netball equipment which include; two free netball rims with nets, two netball balls, two sets of netball training bibs, and one packet of finger-held whistles were donated by CSED Initiative to each participant for their schools.