Games plan to get children active

Cadbury South Africa and the national departments of sports, recreation and education joined hands to launch a sports initiative that will ‘get our youth active” by taking part in sports activities.

The launch comes against the backdrop of increasing rates of obesity among school children mainly because of a lack of physical activity.

Two years ago, statistics by the South African National Food Consumption Survey painted a worrying picture that ‘one in 13 children between the ages of one and nine in formal urban areas is overweight”.

Rising levels of juvenile criminality are also blamed on the lack of activities that would keep children off the street.

Deputy Minister of Education Enver Surty said the programme coincided with his department’s five-year plan to ‘reintroduce physical education into the school curriculum”. Surty acknowledged that it was a mistake to exclude physical education from the curriculum.

At the moment, sports activities are offered under life orientation and sports teachers complain that this arrangement has disadvantaged physical education because of the limited time it is allocated.

Called Cadbury School Games, the initiative would host athletic tournaments where an estimated 1 300 high schools nationally would participate. The sponsorship is valid for one year and would also include prizes and bursaries.

Minister of Sport and Recreation Makhenkesi Stofile said that, despite encouraging a balanced and healthy lifestyle among the youth, sports also help to cultivate certain values such as physical and mental endurance. He used as an example ‘one of my few sports heroes,” Oscar Pistorius, a double amputee who fell down during a race in the Summer Paralympics held in Athens in 2004.

Stofile said: ‘Instead of giving up, Oscar got on to his feet, dusted himself off and ran until he won the race.” He went on to break the double amputee world record. Stofile said this is the spirit they hope to foster with this initiative, adding that they want youths who would display a never-say-die spirit despite initial false starts.

Selected top-class South African athletes would mentor promising young athletes and also assist them with motivational talks, training and nutritional guidelines. Members of the mentorship programme are Pistorius, Ofentse Mogawane, a 400m sprinter, and Louis Jacob van Zyl, a 400m hurdler.

Speaking on behalf of the mentors, Pistorius said they were excited to be part of the mentorship programme and would do their utmost to help, especially children who had no access to proper training facilities and experienced trainers.

Said Pistorius: ‘it’s important to remember that, although the final results of a game or event are very important, it is still only a game. Sometimes we lose, and sometimes we win. The key is to learn from your mistakes and try not to make them again. This does not mean ever giving up on your dreams.”

Elaborating on the bursary scheme, Cadbury South Africa’s director of marketing, Geoff Whyte, said this would be made available to the five ‘most deserving athletes participating at the finals”.

He said this ‘will give these learners the opportunity to grow and nurture their talent through having access to South Africa’s best trainers and training programmes while at the same time benefiting from all the opportunities afforded to individuals attending top sporting schools”.

School tournaments would culminate in a ‘grand finale” in Sasolburg, Mpumalanga, in September this year. This will see 500 top athletes, who would have been through ‘the rigorous qualifying trials”, sweat it out on the day. Athletics South Africa will help set standards in 14 track and fields events. So, to all learners: get on your marks, get set, and go!

The facts