The coveted finals of two primary school level nationwide gold cup football tournaments named after Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Bangamata Begum Fazilatunnesa Mujib will be held today (Wednesday) in the capital.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is expected to be present in the finals as the chief guest.
An official familiar with the events said Bangabandhu Gold Cup Primary School Football tournament final will be held at 1 pm to be followed by Fazilatunnesa Mujib Gold Cup final match at 3 pm and the premier is set to distribute prizes among the participating teams.
State-owned Bangladesh Television (BTV) will telecast live both the finals.
Ahead of the two tournaments, President Abdul Hamid and the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina issued separate statements appreciating the arrangements of the two competitions with participation of a huge number of young children countrywide and expecting the events to instill into them the virtues of sportsmanship and human values.
The president said physical, mental social and moral development of a child begins from his primary education and sports can play a vital role for a child’s healthy development. Besides, sports create competitive attitude, mutual respect and responsibilities.
From this understanding, the Primary and Mass Education Ministry incepted the two tournaments in the names of Father of the Nation ‘Bangabandhu Gold Cup Primary School Football tournament in 2010 and ‘Bangamata Sheikh Fazilatunnesa Mujib Gold Cup Primary School Football Tournaments in 2011, he added.
The President said the events would create scopes for young children of today to know about Bangabandhu and Bangamata and they will be groomed as worthy citizens.
The Bangabandhu and Bangamata Sheikh Fazilatunnesa Mujib Gold Cup Primary School Football Gold Cup Primary School Football tournaments have been playing a unique role to create budding booters in the country, he said. In her message, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said, “These (two) tournaments will instill into the primary school students the sense of patriotism, discipline, brotherhood, liberality and the quality of leadership.”
She said: “Through this tournaments the tender-mind children will be able to learn about Bangabandhu and Bangamata and their love and sacrifice for the country and being motivated, they will develop themselves as self-determined that would develop the rare mentality of accepting (others) victory as well as their (own) defeat and imbue with the ideals of Bangabandhu to build the Golden Bengal as dreamt by the Father of the Nation.”
