After Hannah Reuben lost her Women’s Freestyle 76kg fight 5-2 to Enkh-Amaryn Davaanasan of Mongolia in the round of 16 tie yesterday. It is confirmed that Nigeria will be heading home from Paris 2024 Olympics games without a medal,a repeat of Seoul 1988 and London 2012.
President Bola Tinubu had in July approved N12 billion for Nigeria’s participation at the Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games,in which N9bn and N3bn are to be spent respectively.
And as questions are being asked of each Federation heads,the Minister for youth and sports development Sen. John Owan Enoh has described Team Nigeria’s outing in the Olympics as woeful and unacceptable.
“As we go back home we must do everything to prevent future occurrence of the Paris disaster and if this will entail the review of how people are elected to lead our sporting Federations, it will be done,” Enoh said.
And speaking on the upcoming Federation elections,the minister said;“I know that elections into the Federations are coming and it will be the perfect platform to get only those who have something to offer to lead the various sports.”
As the minister calls for reforms and aims at enhancing the leadership and effectiveness of Nigeria’s sports federations that will pave way for improved performance on the global events,it should be noted that even he has a lot to improve on rather that putting all the blames on Federations heads.
Sports development in countries that are serious about it are being carried out by creating environments and platform for young and talented athletes to grow,not by monitoring elections into sports Federations, but by enlisting the services of Sports Analyst,former athletes and stakeholders to avoid a repeat of waisting another N12bn taxpayers money.