Dakar - Senegal — The 4th Edition of the ECOWAS Traditional Wresting Tournament opens on Thursday 9th June in Dakar, the Senegalese capital, with 65 wrestlers from 13 of the 15 Member States competing for honours.
Wrestlers from Benin, Burkina Faso, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Togo will join their counterparts from host country Senegal to vie for honours in individual and team category of the 65Kg, 75Kg, 85Kg, -100Kg and 100Kg bouts.
Winners in the individual and team categories will take home cash prizes in addition to medals and trophies. Traditional wrestling is popular in Senegal and has received a boost since ECOWAS Heads of State and Government adopted it as an official sport and made the regional competition an annual event.
Sixty-five wrestlers from 13 member States competed for titles in the 3rd Edition of the tournament which also took place in Dakar, Senegal in 2010.
The cash awards for individual categories are:
1st Prize - 1,250,000 FCFA,
2nd Prize -750,000 FCFA
and 3rd Prize -375,000 FCFA.
The prizes for team category are:
1st - 2,500,000 FCFA,
2nd -1,500,000 FCFA and
3rd -750,000 FCFA.
The winners for individual categories in 2010 were as follows:
1. 65KG CHEIK N'DIAYE (Senegal)
2. 75KG AUGUSTO MIDANA (Guinea Bissau)
3. 85KG YACOUBA ADAMOU (Niger)
4. - 100KG OUMAROU BINDIGAO (Niger)
5. + 100KG HAROUNA ABDOU (Niger)
Winners in the team category were:
1. Senegal
2. Niger
3. Nigeria