Femi Solaja
14 May 2008
Lagos — The apex bank in the country has set aside N4.6 million for this year's edition of it's Central Bank of Nigeria Senior Tennis Championship which will get underway from at the Tennis Courts of National Stadium, Lagos.
The competition , which is in its 30th edition according to the company's Deputy Coorporate Affiars Manager, Festus Odogwu who stood in for the Mr Patrick Atamah Special Adviser to CBN Governor, Prof Chukwuma Soludo explained that aside the fact that its a special edition, it has always been the wish of the company to raise the stake evevry yaers so that the players will always have every thing to play for.
"This long partnership in the devlopment of tennis has put CBN in the league of outstanding organizations that have lived up to expectations in its social responsibility and you will recall that the tournament has produced several star players like Sadiq Abdullahi, David Imonite, Remi Osho,, Sunday Maku, Veronica Oyibokia, Rolake Olagbeji, Clara Udofia, Margaret Olagundoye and Nduka Odizor.
"To the best of our knowledge, the tournament as become the yard stick in the selection of player for country's representatives to international competions like the All-Africa Games and the Davis Cup and it is are determination that new stars discovered at the CBN junior tennis last month will be part of the programme aimed at nutiring young stars to stadom," he commented.
In his response, the First Vice President of Nigeria Tennis Federation (NTF) Adeyemi Owoseni, commended CBN for their unbroken 30 years of sponsorship of tennis in the country and urged other corporate bodies to emulate the gesture of the company in the drive to alow youths to disply their tallents.
The tournament will be in four categories namenly, Men's singles, Women single, Ladies and Mens doubles while the winner in the men section will take home N500, 000 while his ladies counterpart will recieve N250, 000.
The winners of Men's doubles will collect N150, 000 and the Ladies counterpart will have N100, 000. in the prize fund, all the players that reach the draw of 32 in both categories are listed in the prize money chart.
Top seed, Shehu Lawal from Kaduna State is the defending champion and he is expected to face tough challenge from the likes of Abdul-Mumini Aminu, Da-Silva Destiny and the rest of top players in the country who missed participation at the recently concluded Davis Cup tournament.
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