₦airaland Forum

The first eight years of the 16 years the People Democratic Party governed Nigeria with retired military General, Olusegun Obasanjo as president was not too good for Nigerian youths who saw sports as a way to survive the economic hardship.

Before 1999 when the military were forced out of power, sports was used by them to gain legitimacy with the people. Money was voted for sports development and participation of athletes in international competitions.

A typical example of the military as a success in sports development and management was through one of its own, the late Brigadier-General Samuel Ogbemudia, who not only had the passion for sports but was also a trained coach who transformed sports in the then Midwest State as a military governor.

The legacy he left for the state which later metamorphosed into Edo and Delta state remains unequalled in the country as the two states have continued to churn out sports talents who make impact nationally and globally.

The military at the federal level latched unto the success of Ogbemudia in Midwest and later Bendel and virtually took over the administration of sports nationally. They however, didn’t get it right like in Bendel where Ogbemudia did not only provide infrastructure and money for athletes participation, but ensured the talents were products of grass-root development which he achieved through school sports.
Athletes were not only rewarded with physical cash, as bread winners of their various families but got scholarships to further their education in both secondary and tertiary institutions. This became an added impetus to motivate the youth to take to sports.

The emergence of Obasanjo who introduced the policy of handshake in place of cash reward for athletes who are mostly from poor homes changed all that. Athletes lost interest in participating in sports while the budding talents who saw how older athletes earned a living through it and respect for themselves and their families and wanted to take to sports started having a change of heart.

However, the major cause of the decline in grass-root sports was the desire of the administrators to win at all costs because of the reward from government. Instead of taking pains to groom talents into budding stars, administrators and coaches in particular started using over aged players to win competitions. Emphasis then shifted from development to competition which was a quicker way to easy money for the administrators.

Even when the Obasanjo regime recanted on the handshake policy, the athletes were no longer too keen in representing Nigeria in competitions as most European and Asian countries had started enticing star athletes from Nigeria and other parts of Africa with offers which changed their life status.

The dip continued all through the PDP regime although Dr Goodluck Jonathan tried to boost athletes’ welfare. Even then, it was limited to those who competed as no concerted effort was made to go back to school sports which served and will continue to serve as the reservoir for talents in sports.

So when the wind of change in the governance started blowing at the tail end of the Jonathan regime and eventually swept his regime away and ushered in the APC government of no nonsense ex military head of state, Muhammdu Buhari as president, hope for the revival of the sector within the sports family was rekindled.

Unfortunately as was typical of the past governments which appointed ministers on sentiments of party loyalty and closeness to the power brokers, another round peg was posted in the square hole of sports.
The man on whose shoulders sports was put since 2015, Barrister Solomon Dalung, whose only claim to sports was secondary school football, where he claimed he earned the sobriquet ‘small pepper’, because of “the way I peppered defenders”, confirmed the fears of the stakeholders that sports was in for a hard time.

He came with vengeance, swearing to clean up the “rotten and corrupt sports ministry”. He claimed he was cheated out of some US dollars as a member of the Federal Government delegation to the 2002 Africa Nations Cup in Mali. But has he been able to ‘clean’ up the system? No.

The first wrong salvo Dalung fired and showed he had no clue about the sector he was assigned to manage was when a few days to the 2016 Rio Olympics, instead of sourcing funds to keep athletes in training, preparing for the Games, he told the world that athletes didn’t really need long term training to excel but just the winning mentality.

Not knowing how his athletes would get to Brazil for the Olympics, he was quick to jump into the plane to Brazil, not even once, to inspect the facilities they would use at the Games. Surprisingly though, more so when he was not a coach or technical man of any of the sports.

Worst still was when some of the athletes took to the social media to beg fans and friends alike to help them raise funds to pay their way to Rio to represent their fatherland. And yet the government voted money for the event.

The way and manner he disowned the football team handled by Samson Siasia who got stranded in the US where they had gone to prepare for the Games before they were bailed out by an American airline, Delta airline, was shocking and embarrassing.. Even the Japanese billionaire who offered to reward the team for winning the only medal the country had, following the pains they went through to achieve that, was derided and his gift questioned.

If the sports ministry was known in the past to concentrate mainly in sending athletes for competitions and ignoring grass-roots development before the emergence of Dalung as minister, he has taken it to an abysmal level in the short two years he has been in the saddle.

Nigerian athletes no longer attend competitions even though the federal government keep budgeting money for sports annually. It was a big shame that Nigerian youths could not attend the Commonwealth Youth Games in the Bahamas for lack of funds but the minister found money to visit the country for a competition he was not certain his athletes would attend.

After the Bahamas embarrassment, the ministry once again bungled the IAAF World U-18 Championships in Kenya. After training for some months, the young athletes were eventually decamped and told to go back home, again for lack of funds. A youth competition for that matter, from where replacements would have been gotten to replace some of the older ones who are retiring now.


The national embarrassment continued this month. Athletes were holed up in the country because logistics for their visas were bungled. When they eventually got visas few days to the opening of the IAAF World Championships, flight tickets became another issue and thus they arrived London late. Any reason the failure is so monumental?

Dalung has no programme on ground as to how he intends to revive sports. Even the committees he set up to seek ways to revive sports have either been ignored with their report thrown aside like in the case of the committee headed by Ibrahim Galadima to restructure football or their recommendations interpreted upside down as he did with the Godwin Kienka committee on Sports Reform.

Unless the present government will be man enough to replace this party loyalist who has really under performed and look for a real technocrat to head a reformed sports commission to be supervised by a board that will seek support from the private sector, sports will remain in the doldrums under Solomon Dalung. This is because he has shown he has no clue to reviving sports in the country and making Nigeria take her rightful position in the world of sports.

4ckyou:
First of all a big thank you to the host for giving me the opportunity to express my feelings and to everybody viewing this thread


Dear Ireneony

How are you? and hope you are fine, am sorry I have to drag you into this I know you are busy but as they say opportunities don't come all the time, I know it's kinda funny but I have to confess honestly I have been waiting for opportunity like this some might call it a competition but to me it's a chance to express my feelings, from the moment I saw your pics and post on nairaland I have been fighting this strange battle that I don't understand, It's just like the seeker and the confessor which the seeker can't date the confessor because she will confess him and be under her command, but in this case I have feelings for you but I can't express it because no opportunity.

you are the most beautiful girl I have ever seen in my life and yes God created the world in SIX days But I believe it took Him centuries to come up with someone as beautiful as u are, sometimes I do pray and call your name because you definitely look like an angel.

I always check your pictures on nairaland i even track you on Instagram just to see your pics, I can't go a day without viewing your profile to see if you have post another picture, and when I learnt that you half Edo my state, my feeling drastically increase not because am a tribalist who hate other tribes but because I feel a kinda of strong connection with anybody from my state, please irene (angel) If could be any part of you, I would be your tear, To be conceived in your heart, born in your eyes, live on your cheeks, and die on your lips.
can I tell you a secret? am a student and sometimes I feel lazy to read but when I think about you and see that a lazy person can't have future with you then i will pull my legs up and start reading just to come out with good grade for good work, if by chance I have the opportunity to be with you later on then I believe I will have the money to take good care of you because I believe someone like you deserve every good things of this world. it's funny right? you dont know me but yet you ginger me to read everyday.
During the day you always on my mind and even in the night you always in my dream, dreams are for dreaming I dream for you, Hearts are for beating mine beats for you, Angels are for keeping. Can I keep you?

odogwubiafra:
Fayose is the mouthpiece of the masses. Can't wait for 2019 to vote for the man of the people, if eventually he runs.

marisdgreat:
shebi na him promise airtime on his birthday wey e no give

Tocheagle:
Scoring cheap points

Cuteamigo1:
i fully support north korea on this. why would the us dictate to the world who can or cant own a nuke.

Lloydfather:
nne isi na inahi anu Igbo?

nerodenero:
You dumped a Kelechi Iheanacho for Kayode Olanrewaju!!! Una don dey Kolo!!! Anyway, congratulations and I wish you well.

Dlordsamurai:
Ritababe i believe we have an unfinish business.

Dlordsamurai:
you wan show urself abi?

Dlordsamurai:
you wan show urself abi?

PhonePlanet:
it's a tutorial video showing how to fit a pipe in a hole such that if done properly, the pipe begins to pump out white waters. The whole takes a while to get it right, but at the end helps improve the health and mental, social and physical well being of a human.

Lloydfather:
nne hapu BLACKdagger sorom aham bu lloydfather, ano m na Alaba int'l lagos ighotago

kushercain:
I want to woo you Cc:naijaboi

BLACKdagger:
Imaka..nwa. Kedu ur location.

rawpadgin:
good morning

didn't said they are uglee.
they look too young, from their looks, they are not mature enough for a serious relationship


precisely where in Edo state are u from?

Fourwinds:
hahahahahahahahaaaa.....rita u bahd gon

gGGODDd:
so will u invite me next time? pls�

BLACKdagger:
Adim ok. Ana ebi?.

Fourwinds:
check where u are most active on this platform...u can be mischievous

rawpadgin:
didn't u clicked on the link?
Dem look like children Wen nor form well for belle
Where are my manners!
The name's lucky
Most of ur threads are about edo state, are u from there?

gGGODDd:
That day 4 niggaz gang banged or fvckkd d hell out of u in an uncompleted buildn close to ur house n u sucked their dickkks each after which they came all over ur face. do u remember dat day? good. if somebody caught u in dat act n videos it all then it would've been a hot porn video. That's porn video, so next time u can invite me to that kinda Bleep n I wud come with my camera n c.d to show u a porn video. even d hot fvck u got last night with those bingos is also a porn video. so I guess u knw wat porn video is now. its that act u've been doing n cannot do without since u were 12.

Fourwinds:
Ritababe dey ask of what is porn video..... nawa ooooo...I dey hail ooooo

BLACKdagger:
Nwaoma!