Winners emerge in Junior Golf Championships

Awa Ibrahim junior-golf Championships

Lucky Onjefo of St. David Mark Golf Academy and Country Club, Akpegede, Benue, has won the 3rd Awa Ibrahim Junior Golf Open Championships at the Ikeja Golf Club.

The annual three-day competition, aimed at discovering young golfers aged 15 and below, was used to mark golf enthusiast, Alhaji Awa Ibrahim’s birthday on Oct. 19.

The competition ended on Saturday in the male category with Onjefo from St. David Mark Golf Academy and Country Club winning the grand prize, while Chukwu Odi emerged second in the U-16 to U-18.

For the U-13 to U-11 category, Alachenu Odey from St. David Mark Golf Academy was the champion, while John Alex from the same academy emerged second.

In the U-10 category, Mark Osimeh of St David Mark Golf Academy took the first prize, while from the same academy, Godwin Okoko emerged the first runner-up.

In the Girls’ U-16 to U-18 category, Blessing Abdul from St David Mark Golf Academy emerged the overall winner, while Blessing Odey also from the academy won the second prize.

Also, in the U-13 to U-15 category, Victoria Atamajah from St David Mark Golf Academy came out tops, while Stella Musa her colleague, followed closely in the second place.

The boy’s champion, Onjefo, said he was happy to have won the championships, adding that it had been his dream to be a champion in golf.

“I always want to play golf and I don’t get tired of it at all. We have a good academy where we are trained to become champions.

“Our academy experience helps us a lot and we have an edge over others because we only concentrated on playing golf,’’ he said.

Also, the best girl for the tournament, Blessing Abdul, said that the support she got from her coach endeared her to the game.

“My coach is always reassuring about my prospect playing golf. I got enough encouragement from him that keeps me going. I have been to many places in the country because of golf.

“At first, I thought golf is not for me but now, I know better and I hope that one day, I will represent the country,’’ she said.

President of Nigeria Golf Federation NGF), Nasir Mohammed, lauded the sponsor of the championships, saying that it was the only grassroots events in the calendar of the federation.

“The Awa Ibrahim Junior Open Golf Championships is the only youth tournament in the calendar of NGF; we need to applaud the sponsor.

“We want to see golfing in the ranks of other sports such as football, basketball and other popular sports.

“I want to say here that the winners of the last Awa Ibrahim Open Junior Championships also won the African Junior Championships in Tunis, Tunisia, and that is the gain of the event,’’ he said.

The highlights of the championships were that the representatives of St. David Mark Golf Academy and Country Club almost carted the entire available prizes.

The representatives from the academy won 12 medals out of the 15 medals on offer.