By GWEN CHIPASULA –
SAMSUNG Zambia says its partnership with the Olympic Youth Development Centre (OYDC) is yielding positive results.
Company business leader James Chona said Samsung said he was impressed that the OYDC has continued delivering results since their partnership in 2011 and promised continued support to the institution.
Chona said this yesterday when he watched the judo games held under the Samsung Challenge at the OYDC.
“Samsung is impressed with the results of the challenge, we are happy to have partnered with OYDC and we will give them as much support as we can to ensure this much success still goes on’’ he said.
Chona also hailed the Zambia Judo Association (ZJA) for their support towards the Samsung Challenge and urged the judokas to continue their hardworking as their efforts in past competition has paid off with medals.
He said his organisation will continue to support the OYDC in running of the Youth Sports Challenge and will be making regular checkups to see how the five sporting disciplines were performing.
Judo national team coach Moola Lipimile thanked Samsung Zambia for providing judokas across the country with a platform.
Lipimile said before the Samsung Challenge was launched, judokas hard nowhere to showcase their skills and learn more about the sport.
He said it is from the challenge that high profile judokas such as Nokutula Banda, Joshua Nyondo, Mary Kanyemba and others started from before graduating into the national team.
“We are very happy to be one of the sports that are taking part in the Samsung Youth Sports Challenge.
Before this project started, most of our senior and junior athletes did not have a starting point but today we have big names in judo such as Nokutula, Joshua, Mary and the others that have been identified from this challenge ’’ he said.
He said the Samsung Challenge has helped empower the girl child and also expressed happiness with the impact the Challenge has had on the athletes.