Hyundai Motors, one of the tournament’s official sponsors of the just concluded FIFA World Cup which held in South Africa, said it came about the initiative “as a symbol of hope and motivation to achieve greater things in life as well as allow for educational development and the identification of greater opportunity.”

At the programme, which held recently at Campos Mini Stadium, Ajele area of Lagos Island, Lagos State, the Marketing Director, Hyundai Motors Nigeria Limited, Mr. Kiran Parab, said part of the aims of the project was “to roll out football fever to children with limited access to sports and educational opportunities right across the continent.”

Over the period of a year, Parab said “children in all 53 African countries in Africa will benefit from the programme, which aims to teach life skills such as team work and strategy, build confidence and motivate performance through the realisation of their inner potential.

At the launch of the ‘One Million Dream Balls for Africa’ initiative on the 8th of June 2010 at the ‘Sports for Peace’ UN Gala held at Constitution Hill, Johannesburg, president and CEO of Hyundai Motor Company, Mr. Steve S. Yang, handed over the first soccer ball to the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, in a gesture of goodwill between the two parties.

Parab said “the delivery of soccer balls to all corners of the African continent will be assumed by NGOs and organisations under the auspices of the United Nations from July to December 2010.

“Of the 100,000 footballs already prepared, 30,000 will be delivered to six countries selected for the Hyundai ‘Africa Road Tour’ of the continent, with the other 70,000 distributed by the UN and other NGOs in several countries and the rest of the one million gradually spread out across Africa throughout the year.”