It’s so obvious how so many children and youths in Nigeria don’t know a thing about their backgrounds or roots.
This is very evident in their inability to speak their mother tongue fluently as they speak the English Language.
In my opinion, I think young people should be infused with a lot about their culture and their history and background.
Well, because of this reason;
Mr. Chinedu Aniagboso, and City Speller Bee in partnership with Onitsha Business School. decided to something about this.
Mr Chinedu is Nigeria’s first indigenous language spelling Project Manager. According to him, the reason for this project was to attract young people to thrive hard in learning and Understanding their various indigenous languages.
“You can see how excited these students are competing in their own language; they not only understand English, they are also proficient in Igbo,” he said.
He made the above statement after the first episode of the indigenous language spelling bee kicked for the indigenous people of the Igbo culture.
It was such an amazing thing to see how very young people could clearly understand and fluently speak their native language (Igbo). Their parents would be so proud of them.
At the end of the competition, 14-year-old Oluebeube Ogbonna, emerged as the best and also the winner of the competition.
The competition was held at Anambra state, South-East Nigeria.
Oluebeube Ogbonna is a student of Divine Rays British School, located in Anambra, Nigeria and she competited against other 356 contestants from schools in Awka, Nnewi and Onitsha educational zones to emerge as the lucky and deserving winner.
In the competition, students were assessed based on:
• Knowledge of spelling
• Igbo syllabication
• Punctuation
Oluebeube Ogbonna the winner of the competition also won for herself the sum of N300,000 for the first position.
In second position, Oruche Chukwuma of St Paul’s Seminary Ukpor Was rewarded with the sum of N100,000.
In third position Okeke Godswill of Divine Rays British School Obosi was awarded the sum of N50,000.
Mr. Chinedu hopes to make it an annual event and reached out to a lot of bodies in the country to sponsor and to partner with them to foster the growth of students in the native language.
How well can speak and understand your native language?
So well that you can win N300,000 for it?
Let us know in the comments section.
