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| Benjamin and Timi on the flight to South Africa to cover the World cup Since the Russia 2018 world cup soccer tournament started on the 14 of June, 2018, Nigerian and Ghanaian soccer fans have thoroughly been enjoying the innovative humourous pidgin English commentaries from Supersports duo of Benjamin Okenna Sawadinho and Timi Owoeye Pcfr. |
The duo held the viewers
on Supersports3 channel 233 with their overflowing talent throughout.
Yesterday, Okenna Sawadinho
handled the England/ Belgium match while Owoeye, the Pidgin Commentator
of the Federal Republic(Pcfr) will handle the final match today Sunday
15th July 2018 between France and Croatia
The voices took Nigerian
by surprise and has been doing so keeping soccer lovers glued to SuperSports3
channel 233.
The duo shared the 64
matches between themselves and held Nigerian listeners and viewers spellbound
with their down to earth Pidgin English commentary as the matches were played
causing them to forget the early first round ouster of the Eagles.
Okenna handled some of
the matches including Denmark/France, Denmark/Australia, France/ Peru including England / Belgium
third place match etc while
Owoeye did Nigeria/Argentina, Argentina/ Croatia as well as the final match coming up this afternoon. They
have in so doing created what seems like a cult following for themselves both
on social media and other platforms for their spice of the Russia 2018
tournament.
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| Benjamin Okenna( Sawadinho) |
Okenna who is also a
gospel musician whose album in a duet with Preye Odede (God never
disappoints)is getting more popular in Port Harcourt where he started has
always been very thankful and continues to give glory to God for the
opportunity to exhibit a God given talent.
He started by running
commentaries in pidgin English in local soccer tournaments in Rumuokwrushi ,
Port Harcourt, made an album before answering the call by Supersports to run
commentaries for the then Glo league.
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| Timi Owoeye Pcfr |
Owoeye a 2012 graduate
of Federal University of Technology Akure got involved in sports broadcasting
and presentation for a syndicated programme on Vision Africa Radio and Cross
River Radio. Before then, he had never been on any radio show even
though he beilieved he could do it before Kufre Ekpe of 82 Ideas Communications
gave him the chance to anchor Sports Informate, a 15 minutes radio
programme. Things changed when he responded to an advert calling for pidgin
language presenters”
In a chat with Supersports GM Felix Awogu the pidgin English
innovation is in “keeping with the policy of promoting sports in indigenous
languages in Africa by the organization that the pidgin commentary came to be.
Pidgin English is well received across West Africa. Other indigenous languages
on the channel are Swahili, Afrikaan and Arabic.
Awogu said the huge
reception and acceptance of the commentaries during the Super sports
commentaries of the Nigerian premier league informed the decision to introduce
it to covering the world cup especially as Nigeria qualified. The duo was moved
to South Africa where the Russia 2018 studios were built from where they
reached the world.
By Fred Iwenjora
Nice one, bros.
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