Over 8,000 For Oil Industry Games

From the creeks of the Niger Delta through the skyscrapping corporate offices of the oil companies, over 8,000 workers are expected to storm Lagos for the eleventh edition of the biennial oil industry games.

The event opens on February 13 at the cosy Chevron Staff Club in Gbagada, Lagos, and will run till February 18, when the closing ceremony will be performed at the National stadium, Surulere. Some aspects of the games will also be staged at the Ikoyi Club. Chairman of the organising committee of the games, Peter Odjoji of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, told journalists in Lagos, Thursday, that fourteen oil companies have entered for the games.

They include Chevron, Agip, the Petroleum Training Institute warri, Exxon Mobil, Oando, Total, Shell, the NNPC, ELF, Conoco/Phillips, Addax and the Nigeria NLG limited. Halliburton joins Schlumberger this year to represent the oil services sub-sector. Contingents from the companies will be contesting for honours in the ten sports of Lawn Tennis, Table Tennis, swimming, squash rackets, snooker, scrabble, chess, golf and men/women 100m dash.

For Odjoji, the competition is a win-win situation for all participants as it provides an opportunity for recreation for the enhancement of healthy body and mind for the workers even as they also will meet and make new friends, interact, exchange ideas and build new relationships.

According to Odjoji, the games this year will be used deliberately to drive in the gas sector of the industry for the public to appreciate the importance of gas in Nigeria's economy. In this regard, the managing director of the Nigeria Liquified Natural Gas Company Limited, NLNG, will be very visible to declare the games open. Odjoji also called out to youths and various hosts communities of the oil and gas industry to embrace peace in order to ensure a more stable national development.

Historically, the Oil Industry games began in 1986 as a purely squash racket championship hosted by Mobil in Eket for NNPC and Mobil Producing. Today, the games have grown from a one-sport affair to a fiesta of ten sports and Odjoji is elated to state that "many companies in the oil and gas industry have shown much enthusiasm in the games."