To fail to plan is to plan to fail! That’s is the summary as former Nigerian sports minister, Solomon Dalung. According to him, the foundation of Team Nigeria was faulty ahead of the just ending Olympic Games.
He faulted the composition of most of the sports federations that produced athletes for the games. According to him, the federations were not well composed to present athletes that would have excelled.
“The federations must command the confidence of the congress. Unfortunately, the foundation I laid to while I was in office had been dismantled”, said Dalung who was Nigeria’s Games master- General from 2015 to 2019.
He is of the opinion that most of the sports federation leadership are not accountable to the congress that elected them. “During my tenure, I enlarged the electoral college to include all stakeholders in sports. I had an all-encompassing board that included even the media. But upon my departure, the structures were dismantled.”
Continuing, Dalung said that he heard the current sports minister, John Owan Enoh saying that the sports sector will have to go back to the drawing board after Paris 2024.
“It must start with accountable sports federation boards. As it is in Nigeria, no sports minister ever had the opportunity of attending two editions of the Olympics owing to the four-yearly cycle of the Olympics. No sports minister stay to implement new idea for the succeeding Olympics.
Dalung said that in his time, he did not have as much fund as it was made available to the current minister. “Money for the Olympics was not released until four days into the Games in Rio. I had to borrow N50 million from Ifeanyi Ubah before the arrival of fund from the Federal Government.
“I travelled to Rio Olympics with my money before I was reimbursed. We had crises, but we managed to solve them. It was tough.”
He said that the demonstration in Nigeria may also have had negative effects on Team Nigeria.
“They are Nigerians and have families at home. The crisis at home will have effect on them and could have made athletes lose focus.”
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