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Ghana has been handed its highest ever number of Olympic scholarships after the Ghana Olympic Committee through Olympic Solidarity awarded 12 sportsmen/women “Rio 2016 scholarships” worth $200,000 at a ceremony today in Accra.

Ghana had never received more than four International Olympic Committee scholarships prior to this latest development with the most recent recipients being Vida Anim and Margaret Simpson, but Team Ghana’s strong showing on the international scene in recent times has received some significant international attention.

These are the first Olympic scholarship awards since Margaret and Vida’s scholarships ended with the completion of the 2012 Olympics. They come after four promising youth athletes were granted scholarships ahead of the 2014 Youth Olympics in Nanjing, China.

The scholarships form part of the GOC’s goal of assisting elite athletes selected and proposed by their National Federations in their preparation and qualification for Rio 2016.

The beneficiaries include the Commonwealth Games judo and boxing bronze medalists Razak Mumuni Abugiri and Abdul Wahid Omar; the athletics quartet of Flings Joyner Owusu-Agyapong, Mathilde Boateng, Robert Martey and Tim Abeyie who competed at the 2014 Commonwealth Games as well as helping Team Athletics to equal Ghana’s record haul of medals at the African Athletics Championships in Marrakech, Morocco.

The list also has 2014 Commonwealth Games participants: judoka Sandra Szogedi, badminton player Daniel Sam, the boxing duo of Sulemanu Tetteh and Jesse Lartey, and the US Open Taekwondo Championships participants David Koney Adjetey and Terrance Tetteh Asare.

As part of the scholarships, the athletes would receive access to appropriate training facilities, pocket money and limited travel costs to Olympic qualification competitions.

The International Olympic Committee awarded the scholarships to the 12 athletes after careful consideration, and in consultation with the International Federations concerned.

This was after the National Federations had sent their applications through the Ghana Olympic Committee to the IOC for consideration.
The Olympic scholarship starts from 1st January, 2015 and will be divided into separate terms, each running for a four-month period leading up to 31st August, 2016.

But the scholarships will only be renewed at the end of each term subject to performance, athletes abiding by the World Anti-Doping code and the conditions set by the GOC and their federations, and a strict disciplinary code.

This brings the GOC’s total contribution to sports development in the country to over $900,000 since 2012.