OUR ROTTEN AND STINKING SPORTS SECTOR: Is Rio 2016 the Tipping Point?

Yours Sincerely was an Nigeria Olympic Committee VIP attaché to Mauritius at the 8th All Africa Games (COJA 2003-Abuja). I had the privilege of working directly with Dr. Babayo Shehu (May his gentle and patriotic soul rest in peace) who happened to be the longest Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Sports in Nigeria's History with whom I struck a sort of father and son relationship that lasted for years after COJA-2003. 

We had our evening dinner meetings and private discussions as routine for the about two weeks we spent at the Transcorp-Hilton Abuja, while the games lasted and I must say that this gentleman opened my eyes to the level of mind boggling corruption that bedeviled Sports development in Nigeria. He revealed to me how a Mafia of Civil Servants, their cronies who they kept imposing heads of various Nigerian Sporting Federations and Sports Journalists who have been pocketed via fat brown envelops have been holding Nigerian Sports down craftily rejecting full scale private sector funding or participation in sports because they never wanted any form of transparency nor accountability in the administration of sports in Nigeria. 

This Mafia held the government on the jugular and caged athletes and sports professionals in a See no evil,hear no evil and say no evil stranglehold. The helpless athletes and sports professionals understood this clearly that their fragile careers would be axed if they dare challenge the evil and greedy Mafia. With this evil and comfortable corrupt hold on the system, there was no way Nigerian sports was ever going to develop as it should. Each time any Nigerian government attempted to scrutinize the operations of these Federations regarding funds allocated to them by government, they criminally pitch their International parent Federations against Nigerian government to the point of suspension threats and actual suspensions which their handy media hatchet jobbers always blow out of proportion against the government. The disgraceful suspension of Dr.Amos Adamu who incidentally headed the COJA-2003 Local Organizing Committee from FIFA on very strong allegations of corruption came as a sort of validation of most of the things Dr. Babayo Shehu revealed to me in our private talks in 2003 and beyond.

While so many people online and offline were rushing to blame the current Sports Minister for the woeful preparations towards the Rio 2016 Olympics, I kept cautioning and pointing at the Nigerian Olympic Committee and the Sporting Federations and their roles in getting our athletes ready for the Olympics, but I guessed in our usual character as Nigerians we were so much in a hurry to lynch without enough reasons and proof. How many Nigerians know about the MILLIONS of United States Dollars that flow into Nigerian Sporting Federations from International Federations annually? How many Nigerians have bothered how Nigerian Federations spend these funds meant for developing athletes and sporting facilities locally? Now that the chicken has come home to roast in the era of CHANGE, we are about to get the clear view of what has been wrong with our sports sector over the years and decades of stagnated growth.

I was filled with pity and empathy for Mr Genshak Golak, the innocent Personal Assistant to current Minister of Youth and Sports as he struggled to present clear position of issues at the Sports Ministry to a deaf crowd who had already made up their minds to lynch his Principal based on the KILLER HATCHET job publications from a media on revenge against a government that for the first time in decades technically denied them their usual and traditional largesse they feed fat on during global sports jamborees like the Olympics and others. Gullible and grossly misinformed people almost turned Genshak Golak into fried meat for trying to state his facts at the wrong time!  

In conclusion, we had bare faced Thieves running our Ministry of Sports, administering our sporting federations, managing our National Teams and stage-managing our sports journalism and reportage for decades before now and time has come for sweeping changes that will clean out our stinking sports room for good. Change is gaining ground in Sports!!!

By Chibueze Iheukwumere Ihejirika