A team of about 200 athletes competing in 15 different sport codes will represent Namibia at the third African Youth Games that start in the Algerian capital, Algiers next week.
The Games serve as a qualifier for the Olympic Youth Games in Argentina in October and expectations are high that Namibia will be well represented in Buenos Aires.
At the official send-off for the team on Wednesday, the permanent secretary of the Ministry of Sport, Emma Kantema-Gaomas said the government was committed to promoting sport.
“Sport is an important sector of society that contributes to national development and employment. The national reward policy will also seek to provide financial support to our athletes and teams that excel at international games,” she said.
“Remember you are representing Namibia. In our eyes you are already winners so go out and make us proud” she added.
The president of the Namibia National Olympic Committee, Abner Xoagub, added that they have high expectations of the team.
“I’d like to thank the parents for their dedication and commitment and the investment they are making in their children, we appreciate that. To the athletes – you will represent Namibia abroad, so go and show that you are from the land of the brave. We want to see 60 percent of these teams qualify for the Youth Olympic Games,” he said.
Namibia will compete in 15 codes, namely athletics, archery, boxing, fencing, cycling, equestrian, gymnastics, hockey, karate, rugby, swimming, tennis, table tennis, triathlon and wrestling.
Most of the codes are qualifying events for the Youth Olympics, but not all and according to Xoagub, they are still finalising their team.
“We are still sorting out the logistics of the whole team, so I can’t say how many will go right now. We first looked at sport codes which can qualify for the Olympic Youth Games, but as resources became available we added non-Olympic qualifying codes, so we are still busy with that,” he said.
“We also looked at the starting dates of the codes and some like boxing only start later at the Games, so there is still time to sort that out,” he added.
At the previous African Youth Games in Gaborone, Botswana four years ago, Namibia finished 10th overall out of 42 African nations, with a total of 25 medals (four gold, 11 silver and 10 bronze).
Egypt was the overall winner with 89 medals in total and 44 gold, followed by South Africa with 93 medals and 41 gold, and Nigeria with 41 medals and 19 gold.
Representatives of several of the sport codes yesterday were in a buoyant mood about their chances.
The manager of the boys hockey team, Andre van der Merwe, said they were well prepared for the Games.
“Our boys are very fit and motivated and I think they stand a good chance of qualifying for the Olympic Youth Games. But the competition will be tough with countries like South Africa, Kenya, Zambia, Algeria, Ghana and Zimbabwe in the mix,” he said.
The Namibian wrestling coach, Luis Forcelledo, is also confident of success after an impressive performance at the African Wrestling Championships in Nigeria last month where they won two silver and three bronze medals.
“I think the results will be better now. We are prepared and did very well at the South African National Wrestling Championships last week where we won nine gold, seven silver and one bronze medal,” he said.
“Lukas Thomas and Romeo Goliat are two of our top young wrestlers and we are grooming them for the 2020 Olympic Games,” he added.
Members of the swimming team are also confident of reaching the qualifying times for the Youth olympic Games.
“Most of us are only one or two seconds behind the qualifying times so we are confident of qualifying,” one of Namibia’s top young swimmers, Hileni Stergiadis said.
The first group of athletes will leave for Algiers on Saturday morning, while the Games start on 19 July and end on 28 July.
–thenamibian
