Abdulraheem Aodu & Bridget Idris
12 October 2008
Kaduna — Nigeria will next year December host 12 countries from five con-tinents in the Commonwealth In-tercontinental Handball Cham-pionship slated for Abuja Natio-nal Stadium according to the Secretary General of the Com-monwealth Handball Associa-tion (CHA).
Retired General Ishola Wil-liams said the 10 days competi-tion will involve two common-wealth countries each from Oceania, Europe, Asia and the Americas, while Africa being the host will contribute four teams to make a total of 12 partici-pating countries. He added that the Commonwealth West Afri-can Men Handball Champion-ship concluded in Kaduna yesterday will serve as West Af-rican qualifier for the intercon-tinental championship.
"We have Intercontinental Handball Championship slated for Abuja early December 2009. The West African qualifiers have just been concluded in Ka-duna. The East African quali-fiers will take place in March 2009 while that of South Africa is sla-ted for April 2009.
"The qualifiers for Asia, Oceania and Europe are sche-duled for May and June 2009, while that of the Americas is ex-pected to hold in July. The win-ners will now meet for the inter-continental championship in Abuja.
"The championship is expec-ted to gulp between N50m and N60million as CHA will provide free feeding, accommo-dation and transportation for all the 12 participating countries. We have met with the FCDA Minister, Dr Aliyu Modibbo Umar for assis-tance and we have engaged the services of Connect Marketing Limited to seek for sponsorship and market the competitions for CHA. They are expected to sell the TV right to a global TV com-pany that would beam the mat-ches live and pay us some money."
Speaking further on the activities of CHA, its Executive Director, Malam Garba Attahiru said apart from organising com-petitions, the association "is also planning a coaching and refereeing clinic for Gambia and Sierra Leone for two weeks to update them on the rules of the game since they are found to be lagging behind in the West Af-rican region.
"The same would be done for Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda in East Africa while Mauritius, Namibia, Lesotho and Bots-wana will benefit the same prog-ramme in South Africa," he ad-ded.
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