Following the widespread and often misleading comments on the Foreign Training Tour of the National U-23 Olympic Football Team to Atlanta, Georgia in the United States of America and the subsequent difficulties the team encountered I respectfully write to put the issue into correct perspective.
2.When the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) approached the Ministry of Youth and Sports for a foreign training tour in preparation for the Rio, Olympics, I explicitly told them the Ministry had no funds because the budget was yet to be approved and implemented. The NFF President, Amaju Pinnick, assured me that they had secured sponsorship through an agent and that all their expenses would be taken care of by the sponsor. But I insisted that the team should not leave the country without NFF extracting commitment to forestall embarrassment.
3.It therefore came as a surprise to me when I heard that the team was having difficulties in paying their bills in Atlanta. When the Secretary of Athletic Federation of Nigeria send an email to athletes to sponsor their tickets to Rio without clearance from me, I directed the Director of High Performance, Angie Taylor to procure tickets for foreign based athletes. However NFF rejected the arrangement and opted to buy tickets for the Under 23 team through their agent one Mr Jairo Panshion. It was only on 1st August, 2016 that the NFF came back to the Ministry requesting for money to charter an aircraft to fly the team to Brazil, because their agent could not secure seats for the team.
4. Seeing that the Dream Team’s first match against Japan was only three days away I immediately approved the release of the sum of $174,000 (One Hundred and Seventy Four Thousand US Dollars) equivalent to N80, 000, 000 (Eighty Million Naira) to NOC and the money was promptly paid by Secretary of NOC into the account of the agent presented by the NFF.
5. After the payment I was again informed that the agent was now demanding that all hotel bills and sundry be settled before the plane would be allowed to take off. I personally prevailed upon the NFF upon to fly the players to Brazil on the assurance that Ministry Officials already in Brazil would settle whatever hotel bills incurred by the players, but he still refused.
6. After the arrangements by the NFF had failed the Ministry secured a second 30 Seater chartered plane through a sports philanthropist Yemi Idowu, who paid $300, 000 with the understanding that when the Ministry revert the earlier payment made to NFF agent he could be settled. Landing and airspace clearances were obtained from the International Olympic Committee (IOC), but the team rejected the aircraft as too small to convey them.
At this stage, the Vice President, Professor Yemi Osibanjo, was contacted by NFF and he secured another aircraft to fly the team to Brazil. However, when I contacted and briefed him on the situation, he decided that it will be wasteful hence there was an aircraft already paid for on ground at the Airport in Atlanta. He then cancelled the arrangement.
At this point, the NFF agent resurfaced again secured an aircraft which conveyed the Team with the understanding that the Ministry will settle him in Rio. The Team barely made it into Manaus in time to face Japan in their first match at the Rio Olympics, which the Dream Team won by 5 – 4.
8. Against the foregoing it is clear that;
i) the foreign tour by the Dream Team was never authorized by the Ministry, due to paucity of funds, but an arrangement by the NFF on the assurance that they had secured a sponsor to foot all their bills.
ii) when the Ministry waded in to avoid further embarrassment to the country by paying for a chartered plane for the Team to be flown to Brazil the effort was frustrated because of unreasonable and unverified claims for hotel bills and sundry.
iii) Even the intervention of the Vice President was desperate attempt by NFF to exploit the pressure from the public to extract unjustified funds from the country.
9. Consequently steps are been taken identified those officials who brought the name of the country to ridicule are appropriately sanctioned.
Thank you.
Solomon Selcap Dalung
Honourable Minister
5th August 2016
Rio,Brazil
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