November 24, 2021
The Sierra Leon Taekwondo Association has commenced a two weeks training courses at the Siaka Stevens Stadium to empower the local coaches.
According to the President of the Sierra Leone Taekwondo Association (SLTA) Oness Abayomi Johnson, the training is an Olympic Solidarity technical training course to empower the local coaches ahead of competitions.
The experts are from Nigeria and Senegal and each has days to instruct and train the local coaches as their main aim is to improve their technical knowledge in the sport of Taekwondo in the Country.
He affirmed that the Association has kick-off its back school projects to scout out new talent that will join the Association and later represent the Country on the international stage.
He added that without upgrading the local coaches that will not help to popularize the sport in the country, whiles furthering that this is the second time the association is going through such training as the last one was conducted in 2014.
Mr. Johnson noted that many of the coaches are not active again, for that reason they decided to get another set of training for the coaches to keep them fit and well prepared for local and international competitions.
Oness Abayomi Johnson thanks the national Olympic Committee that has made it possible for them to get experts from both Nigeria and Senegal.
He called on the Ministry of Sports in collaboration with the National Sports Authority to help the Association with funding as they want to be paying the coaches on monthly bases to help them embark on taking the sports to the Schools.
He further appealed to Cooperate bodies to come on board and help them because they have so many competitions that they want to undertake given that one has to do with the Zone two tournament that is set to take place in December next month but funding has been a serious challenge for them over years.
The last Olympic Games Sierra Leone get an athlete who qualified on a wide card but failed to compete because of the Covid-19 pandemic.