By Dhammika Ratnaweera
The 44th National Sports Festival started with a colourful opening ceremony at the National Sports Complex in Polonnaruwa on Thursday. Sports Minister Faizer Mustafa and State Minister of the Sports Sriyani Wijewickrama were the Chief Guests while Olympic silver medalist Susanthika Jayasinghe was the special guest on this opening ceremony.
The national sports festival will see all Sri Lanka’s leading athletes competing for the next four days with the closing ceremony is expected to be held on 14th of October with the President Maitreepala Sirisena as the chief guest.
Attending at this years’ festival as a special guest, Sri Lanka’s Olympic medalist Susanthika Jayasinghe said that this was the highest honour she had received and was thankful to the minister of sports for the opportunities he had give to assist the development of sports in Sri Lanka. “I had a very tough beginning to my sports career and it is time that we identify real talents at the beginning and nurture them to become medal winning athletes for Sri Lanka.” Jayasinghe said.
Meanwhile Sport Minister Faizer Minister said his ambition is to uplift the sports in everywhere in Sri Lanka. “From Northern Province to Southern Province athletes are coming to this games. Our President like to see development of the sports specially in rural areas. That’s why we decided to hold this Games in Polonnnaruwa.” said sports minister adding that his minisgtry would look into the facilities of the outstation athletes in particular.
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