By Omeiza Ajayi

ABUJA- The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps NSCDC has emerged the overall winner of the maiden edition of the week-long biennial Ministry of Interior Games MIGA which ended at the weekend at the Ahmadu Bello Stadium, Kaduna.

With 37 gold, 17 silver and nine bronze medals, the civil defence team blazed the trail, knocking the Nigerian Police Force team to a distant second position with 11 gold, 20 silver and 18 bronze.

Third on the medals table was the Nigeria Prisons Service with four gold, seven silver and 17 bronze while the Nigeria Immigration Service came fourth with one gold, eight silver and 20 bronze. The Federal Fire Service got one silver to clinch the fifth position while the Ministry of Interior was named the “Best Behaved Team” of the games.

Declaring the games closed, Minister of Interior, Gen. Abdulrahman Dambazau said the essence of the games was to enhance synergy among sister-security agencies and de-emphasize inter-agency rivalry as the federal government continues to deploy paramilitary personnel to recovered areas in the North East.

“I am happy to state that the main agenda of the games is to pursue our integration agenda among the services and the ministry too. This has provided one of the best fora for unity and we have achieved that. While we have achieved that on the field through sports, I want to urge you to also ensure that you carry on with this spirit during operations. Therefore, I urge that this spirit exhibited throughout this past week should continue”, he admonished.

Host governor, Nasir el-Rufai in his remarks pledged commitment to the development of sports in the state, praising participants at the games for exhibiting the highest form of discipline and sportsmanship.

The tournament which featured games like football, volleyball, handball, tennis, badminton, squash among others, had the Minister of Defence, Brig. Gen. Mansur Dan Ali, his counterpart in Youth and Sports, Solomon Dalung, paramilitary service chiefs and the Commandant of the Nigeria Defence Academy, NDA.