Another sporting debacle

If she doesn’t take prompt action, the lack of vision in the Ministry of Sports, incompetence of our sports administrators and antics at the Athletics Federation of Nigeria will continue to frustrate her quite evident talent. Most Nigerians who experience international success in any field do so despite the country rather than because of it. […]

If she doesn’t take prompt action, the lack of vision in the Ministry of Sports, incompetence of our sports administrators and antics at the Athletics Federation of Nigeria will continue to frustrate her quite evident talent. Most Nigerians who experience international success in any field do so despite the country rather than because of it. So it is in Blessing’s case.  It is to her credit that despite the abysmal administration of sports in the country and absence of world class training facilities, she still manages to hold her own in international competition. That Nigerians are more than capable of succeeding in international athletics level is borne out by the fact that Nigerian-born Danielle Alakija,  Andrew Osagie, Phillip Idowu,  Christine Ohu-ruogu, Margaret Adeoye, Eniola Aluko, Francis Obi-kwelu and Ifeoma Dike are all top class international performers, even though none of them represents Nigeria in international track and field competitions.
The 2013 Athletics World Championships were another sporting debacle as the nation could only register the two medals won by Blessing while the other 19 athletes representing Nigeria failed to make any impact. In the 2012 London Olympics Nigeria didn’t win a single medal and the debacle was blamed on poor preparations occasioned by late release of training funds.
This humiliation should have galva-nized authorities into action to redeem our image next time around. Instead the 2013 World Athletics Championships per-formance was yet another sporting disgrace. The National Sports Commission (NSC) claimed that blame for the failure rests squarely at the doors of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) which was once again guilty of poor planning. According to the NSC, the AFN did not give athletes adequate training. On their part the AFN blames their failure on the “normal” late release of funds which hampered preparations.  AFN officials claim they only got the funds approved for the competition when they arrived in Moscow and the games had started!
The importance of sporting success to a nation cannot be overemphasized. In modern times sporting events are about showcasing achievement through spor-ting excellence and showing the world that your country is organized in at least one area. The current shambles in our athletics is symptomatic of the unending malaise afflicting the nation’s leadership.
Hard work, excellence, planning and sacrifice are the ingredients for success in athletics and progress as a nation and the absence of these traits in our leaders is the greatest single cause of our problems. From all indications, given the continued failure of the Ministry of Sports to get their act together, our fortunes aren’t about to change. The NSC continuously blames the late release of training funds as the reason why our athletes fail so woefully at international level. However, though late release of funds may affect athlete’s preparations, this excuse is untenable. A visitor to any athletics centre in the country will see hungry looking “athletes” in their “okrika” (second hand) canvas shoes and tracksuits “training” inside dilapidated structures with no modern facilities. World champions simply cannot be produced from such backgrounds.  Worse still, there is no end to failure in sight because the Ministry of Sports sees no correlation between our poor performances and the fact that school sports have become a thing of the past. Nowadays government approves and licenses schools with no sports facilities whatsoever. There is no more encouragement for young kids to take up athletics. It’s got to the extent that physical education is no longer a participatory activity; it’s now a subject that children are taught in classrooms and write examinations on! Most school children have never been in a gym in their lives! Since 1964 Nigerian has regularly won Olympic medals mostly in athletics. Now all of a sudden the medal haul has dried up and Nigerians no longer expect to win anything.  There is a wide spread belief amongst those involved in sports administration that the lingering problems of Nigerian sports are beyond the capacity of the current minister of sports. Time after time he has presided over sporting debacles. While funds for the minister and his staff to gallivant round the world are always available stories of non-release of funds for the actual sportsmen and women and their coaches are legendary.  As usual our national football coach is being owed salary; as usual player’s bonuses haven’t been paid; as usual athlete’s estacode is still being expected. There is a complete absence of a well-articulated and sustainable sports policy in the country.
Incredibly after the Moscow 2013 debacle the AFN are happily announcing that they are “in the process of articulating a plan” that will guarantee the steady supply of athletes for the nation.  They claim to be “looking to make” the high performance centre in Port Harcourt functional. When this happens they will “look at” eminently qualified coaches who will be able to run the facility”. Then they “hope to have” a world class experienced performance director who can co-ordinate all the coaches.
AFN technical director claims that the federation will “lay down structures that will put the production of potential medal winners on auto-pilot”. Blessing Okagbare should be well advised not to rest her hopes on any of these things actually coming to pass. At the Africa Sport in Diaspora held in London which was aimed at convincing athletes of African descent to ditch foreign countries and represent their country of origin, Nigerian-born athletes made it clear that their country had nothing to offer in terms of fulfilling their potential. An NSC spokesperson said “we did the best we could under the circumstances we found ourselves”. We should thank the minister of sports and the DG for doing their best and retire them in order to re-invigorate our sports administration.  As has been severally pointed out, it is patently obvious that their best is simply not good enough!