The Federal Government has promised to reward athletes who win gold for Nigeria at the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games with $5,000 each.

Sports minister Solomon Dalung, who revealed the financial package for the 90 athletes representing the country at the  21st Commonwealth Games, which open   in the Australian sixth largest city Gold Coast on Wednesday,  said silver medallists would receive $3,000  each, with each   bronze medallists picking up  $2, 000  for their efforts.

However, Dalung  warned  the athletes against  tarnishing the image of the country at the Games.A total of  6,600 athletes from 71 countries are  geared  up for the chase  for  medals in  275 events in 19 sports beginning  from Thursday.

This  is the  fifth-time Australia  is hosting the Commonwealth Games,  and Games Minister Kate Jones told The Courier-Mail,  “We will deliver the best Commonwealth Games ever, here on the Gold Coast, in Queensland.”Organisers of the multisport event  says an estimated 1.5 billion people worldwide will be treated to a celebration of Gold Coast beach and indigenous culture.

Nigeria, who placed  eight with 11 gold 11 silver and 14 bronze  at the Glasgow 2014  Games, will feature in  athletics, basketball, wrestling, weightlifting, boxing, table tennis, gymnastics, para table tennis, para athletics and para powerlifting.Nigeria will present 37  athletes  for athletics, four for weightlifting, five male table tennis players, 12 wrestlers, one gymnast, two para table tennis players, 12 basketball players  and two para athletics.

Blessing Okagbare produced the performance of her career to claim a sprint double at Glasgow 2014, and Nigeria will rely on the multi-talented United States-based athlete again. The 29-year-old is Nigeria’s flag bearer during the opening ceremony.

Aruna Quadri,  who  reached  the quarterfinals of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games table tennis event, the first African to do so, is another medal hopeful for Nigeria, who boast three world record holders, Paul Kehinde, Esther Oyema and Lucy Ejike,  who are favourites to win gold  in powerlifting.

Paralympics and world record holder in the men’s para-powerlifting -65kg category Kehinde said last month his target at  Gold Coast 2018 was to set a record that would stay unbroken for about a decade.

Kehinde won gold at Glasgow  2014  and also won gold at the 2016 Paralympics in Rio after smashing the world record twice with a lift of 220kg.Nigeria won four gold  and two silver  in para powerlifting  at Glasgow 2014.

Kehinde, Oyema, Abdulazeez Ibrahim and Loveline Obiji were gold medallists while Bose Omolayo and Rolland Ezuruike settled for silver.

The Gold Coast 2018  Games will make  history as the first multisport event to award an equal number of medals to men and women since the competition began in Hamilton, Canada, in 1930.