Thirty-two States including the FCT have confirmed their participation in the forthcoming under-17 National Youth Games (NYG) scheduled to begin in Abuja on Thursday, Dec. 5.

Alhassan Yakmut, the Chairman of the Local Organising Committee (LOC) for the games, confirmed this in an interview in Abuja.

According to Yakmut, the participation was confirmed at the end of the Delegate Registration Meeting (DRM) organised by the technical subcommittee in November in Abuja.

Yakmut, who is also the Director, Grassroots Sports Development at the National Sports Commission, told NAN that Zamfara state had indicated interest to participate in the games in spite of its absence at the DRM.

“Already we have confirmed participation from 32 States including the FCT with the total number of 4080 athletes and officials being expected for the 14 different sports.

“The venue and facility committee has earmarked competition ground for each of the sports.

“Maintenance work will start in earnest to ensure that all the dimensions of indoor and outdoor court “are marked and to ensure total environmental sanitation surrounding the competition facilities.

“So far the medical subcommittee had developed a strategic plan for the delivery of medical support.

“On the other side, the doping control committee is ensuring that some couple of tests will be conducted.

“A lot of campaign and advocacy programme will be carried to ensure that these young stars are adequately informed on the dangers of involving themselves with prohibited substances,” Yakmut said.

He said the state of preparedness for the games was encouraging as the staff of the secretariat had redoubled their effort in the last one week to ensure a success event.

The LOC chairman revealed that the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) would provide the transportation need of the games, while sports companies, Puma and Super Sport were assisting in terms of merchandising.

Yakmut added that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) would assist in the feeding of the athletes as part of their corporate social responsibility.

He further said that Mutual Benefit Assurance had insured the games to the tune of N50million naira in case of any accident that may occur during the games.

He commended Nestle Plc, the official title sponsor of the games and Heritage Bank, the official banker, for their support towards the success of the games.

The arrival date for the games has been fixed for Dec. 5, while screening of athletes to ascertain their true age and school will be done on Dec. 6 and Dec. 7.

Also technical meetings will hold on the Dec. 8 in preparatory for the closing ceremony on Dec. 14 while the departure of athletes and officials will be on Dec. 15