The annual Toyota Dream Car Art Contest now in its 8th edition recently took place in three different zones of Nigeria. Eligible to participate in the contest were students in the junior secondary schools as well as primary school pupils cutting across three different age categories children under 8 years, from ages 8 to 11 and those of ages 12 to 15 years.
Some private and public primary as well as secondary schools across cities like Lagos, Abuja, and Port Harcourt took part in the thrilling competition. At the end of the exercise, over 1,000 participants were collated and a panel of Creative Arts professionals and automobile engineers were constituted to do a careful selection using environmental friendliness, safety and futuristic as yardsticks for selection.
Eventually, the zonal contest produced 8 best entries .The owners of the entries, accompanied by their parents/guardians and art teachers were invited to the prize and certificate presentation ceremony which held in Toyota (Nigeria) Limited, head office, Lekki, Lagos to receive their certificates of excellence from Bunmi Onafowokan, the general manager, corporate services, who represented the duo of Chandraskeker Krishnadas Thampy, the managing director and Kunle Ade Ojo, the executive director.
In addition to the certificates, the children were presented with laptops and other corporate gifts that would make the event linger in their memories for a long time. Speaking on behalf of other winners of the contest, Tomide Olunloyo described Toyota as a standard setter in Nigeria.
In his opinion, Toyota has forever been engraved in his mind. He thanked TNL for providing the platform for him and other contestants to showcase their talents and professed to be an owner of a Toyota model in future.
Datoru Tammywho who spoke on behalf of parents and guardians submitted that the gesture on the part of Toyota is like opening a novel dimension in the realm of knowledge impartation and mental development of children across the world in general and in Nigeria in particular.
According to the elated parent, the contest will go a long way in creating emotional bonds between the brands and participating children thereby making Toyota the brand of the future. He enjoined other corporate bodies to emulate this harvest-them-young initiative.
