(CNN) -- Could motorsports become a major industry in football-obsessed Nigeria? It will be if one Nigerian businessman has his way.
London-based entrepreneur Ribi Adeshokan has entered his country into the lavish and highly-competitive world of car racing and has ambitious plans to drive African motorsport and build a multi-million dollar racing industry on the continent.
Called Nigeria Racing Eagle (NRE), the team says it hopes to compete at major motor racing events over the next few months, including the FIA GT3 series and sports car endurance races.
"My philosophy is whatever I want to do, I go for the best," Adeshokan, team principal and owner of NRE said Monday, moments after unveiling a green and silver Audi R8 LMS as the team's car at the Africa Village, a London Olympics exhibition site designed to highlight the continent's cultural, artistic and sport assets.
Adeshokan says his team will proudly "fly the flag of Africa," being the first Nigerian racing team to represent the continent at world motorsports.
"The idea of a racing team called Nigeria Racing Eagle is to use African drivers and gradually develop African mechanics and engineers," he says.
"In the motorsport community I've been asked so many times, 'oh what if they are no good,' or 'you might be, maybe, the last on the grid,' and I say 'yes, I don't care, let's be the last on the grid but we are developing, we are growing,' so that's our main goal for this project."
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An engineer by training, Adeshokan's association with motorsport first started as a hobby in early 2000. But he soon turned his passion into business and in 2007 he set up a racing company called GRC Motorsport.
Adeshokan initially put together a racing side to compete as "Team Nigeria" at the World Cup of Motorsport. But right before he was about to realize his dream, the World Cup series went bankrupt.
Determined Adeshokan devoted further time and money to create NRE. He says his business venture has been solely financed by himself and a few friends who had faith in his vision.
"The biggest challenge is people believing in my dream," he says. "I found out that people struggle to understand and most people never can imagine that motorsport can come to Africa or to Nigeria."
Adeshokan, who recently appointed veteran British motorsport executive John Wickham as team manager, says that right now there is a "50-50" chance for NRE to be ready for the GT3 race in Moscow in early September.
Yet, for Adeshokan and his team, competing at the international motorsport arena is only one part of their goal.
"One of the key pillars of this project is not just about putting together a racing team -- it's about introducing motorsport to West Africa and that means we have to create circuits, we have to create series and, most importantly, we have to create drivers," says Sam Collins, NRE's lead driver.
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