Nigeria’s leading Sports Media & Management company, Making of Champions (MoC), has announced Eroton Exploration & Production Company Limited as its lead sponsor for the 2017 Athletics season, following the Oil & Gas Company’s agreement to sponsor MoC Track Club in Port-Harcourt & Lagos and MoC Media in Nigeria for 1 year.
This was disclosed by MoC Founder/CEO, Bambo Akani at a Press Conference held in Lagos on Thursday, May 25th. The event was attended by the Managing Director/CEO of the company, Ebiaho Emafo, and External and Government Relations Manager, Eroton, Mercy Max-Ebibai.
Speaking at the event, Akani disclosed that it was indeed a momentous occasion for Nigerian Athletics as this is the first time ever an Athletics Track Club in the country has received support from a major sponsor.
He said: “We have a firm belief in combining education and Athletics as it’s done all over the world to make champions, and that is why we launched Nigeria’s first ever Student-Athlete Scholarship in 2016, to send a new generation of Athletes discovered at Top Sprinter to University in Nigeria, while training them to hopefully represent Nigeria at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo!
“It is with this backdrop that I would like announce Eroton Exploration and Production Company as the lead sponsors for Making of Champions in 2017.”
The Eroton Sponsorship will be for a period of 1 year, and it will cover 3 main aspects of the Making of Champions project. Eroton will be the 2017 Sponsor for MoC Track Clubs in Lagos & Port-Harcourt, led by Olympic Medallists Deji Aliu and Uchenna Emedolu. Eroton will also sponsor the critically acclaimed MoC Media Team to continue covering Nigerian athletes at the top competitions all across the nation.
Speaking on behalf of Eroton, Max-Ebibai noted that the company, which is a leading Nigerian indigenous energy company, decided to sponsor MoC’s Athletics Track Club in Port-Harcourt as part of its commitment to positively improve the lives of Nigerians through its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programme.
She said: “For the last three years, MoC has been a beacon of hope in Nigerian Athletics. Their mission of marrying education with sporting success is one that resonates deeply with our core values – care for people and our environment, accountability, delivering what we promised, excellence and integrity.
“MoC has taken ownership of the lofty task of reviving Nigerian Athletics, and this is why in January of this year, Eroton agreed to sponsor the opening of their new Track Club in Port-Harcourt, which has been strategically located to cater for MoC Athletes studying at the University of Port-Harcourt, where the IAAF High Performance Centre is located.
“Since then, we have provided the support that has enabled MoC to relocate Olympic Medallist Uchenna Emedolu to Port-Harcourt, as the Head Coach for MoC Track Club.”
Chairman of Eroton Exploration & Production, Onajite Okoloko, has personally overseen the development and implementation of Eroton’s CSR programmes to date, and it is his firm belief in giving back to the communities that they operate in and to the nation as a whole that has led to Eroton throwing its support behind Making of Champions.
MoC Track Club is the first in Nigeria to give athletes a platform where they can be sponsored or given scholarships to study in Nigerian schools and Universities, whilst competing with the goal of becoming Olympians for Nigeria at the same time.
