The Minister of Sports and Chairman, National Sports Commission, Bolaji Abdullahi, has revealed that President Goodluck Jonathan is targeting five gold medals from Rio 2016 Olympics despite the abysmal failure of Team Nigeria at London 2012 Olympics.

Nigeria finished the London Games as one the worst teams, failing to win any medal but Abdullahi said on Channels Television on Wednesday that Jonathan wants an early preparation for the next Games and expects no fewer than five golds.

“Mr. President believes if we start to work now we can win five gold medals in Rio in 2016. If we start to work towards that target, we may or may not meet it, but we must begin now to work towards it and believe it is possible,” Abdullahi said.

“It seems we’re under pressure now; everybody is angry and outraged. But we must resist the temptation for reflex action. We can’t just start doing things because we want people to see that we’re responding to stimuli. That’ll be wrong and won’t be sustainable.

“What we need to do is to be very deliberate and conscious about what we need to do. There’s not going to be an easy solution, there’s not going to be a quick fix. What we’re talking about (emerged) from many years of decay and collapse. Whatever we do now, we must begin to show result in two years time. That is why it is very good for us that the Commonwealth Games will be coming up in 2014 and we can use that to re-launch for the 2016 Games.

“We shouldn’t forget that football is very critical in Nigeria. We have the Nations Cup coming up in January in South Africa in 2013 and the World Cup in 2014. All these will provide the opportunity for us to begin to rebuild. If we begin today to identify children and talent that can compete well with the right age and exposure, I think we can get them ready for Brazil .

“In Olympic term four years are nothing; we’re actually thinking of an eight-year plan. Some of the countries that did very well in London have already started preparing. We have to start now. We’re considering giving priority to sports that will give us the opportunity to excel and apportion our resources along those lines in short and medium term measures.

“We have to go back to the system that allows us to discover talents; the system that allows us to nurture them and allows us to give them the right exposure.”

Abdullahi said he planned to reconnect the National Sports Commission to the state governments and make the various sports federation more effective in terms of funding sports and discovering talents at the grass roots.

http://www.punchng.com/sports/jonathan-wants-five-gold-medals-from-rio-olympics-abdullahi/

BIG STORY story STORY.Foo,llllsss

2016 That means u are sure of second term Jona Only God can judge.. God please bless Nigeria

[b]This is my suggestion...

Olympics has very little to do with grassroot as much as it has to do with secondary school & University Sports..

The Target Now should be both these institutions. Inter-House Sports and Inter School Sports should be encouraged.. If the Individual State governments organize an ALL STATE INTERSECONDARY SCHOOL SPORTS COMPETITION that covers Track & Field events, then the National Sports Council organizes a National Inter Secondary School Event where all the winners & runners-up from the state level compete in, the best Secondary School level Atheletes can be discovered.. Then Pack them into a Plane and Fly them Abroad on Federal Government Sports Scholarships to the U.S or any country that has good sports facilities.. In 4 years, we would have Top breed, young, fit and patriotic atheletes.. AND dont shoot my idea down.. If we can train Militants/criminals abroad and pay them a salary to do so, why cant we invest in sports for young Nigerians and give them a future?!

All University games as well.. NUGA..

Its not everything that is grassroot related.. If the child on the street can run like Usian Bolt, pick him up, clean him up, get him a tutor or put him in a vocational school and then have that person pursue a sports and technical career at the same time...

I am tired of all these promises and shiit!

Until we start putting technocrats in charge, shiit would continue to stink up the entire place... [/b]

Thats very simple.... Mama p' would give us one gold from weight lifting, while GEJ will give us one gold from swimming, that way we have two gold, we will look for the remaining three..