Nigeria’s Minister of Sports Development, John Enoh has asserted that there would be sanctions on whoever is responsible for the registration error that caused Nigerian athlete Favour Ofili not to participate in the women’s 100m event at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Nigerian sprinter Favour Ofili had announced that she won’t be competing in the women’s 100m at the 2024 Olympics in a statement she posted on social media platform X, attributing it to the Athletics Federation of Nigeria failure to enter her name despite qualifying.
In an interview with ARISE NEWS on Tuesday, Enoh expressed his commitment to addressing the embarrassment caused.
“When the Favour Ofili matter played out, I was also very engaged in terms of what my reaction was. I tried to make a few explanations about that and I said whoever was responsible for that kind of embarrassment was not going to just go free. The fact that nothing has been done about it yet is because we were still in between competitions. We just got back and Nigerians are going to know what our next steps are going to be in terms of that.”
Speaking about the Olympics, where Nigeria failed to secure any medals, Enoh said he issued a public statement taking responsibility and apologising to Nigerians.
He noted that his decision to address the situation immediately was met with mixed reactions from within the sector, with some criticising him for taking undue responsibility.
Enoh noted that his intent was to be accountable and transparent about the shortcomings.
“I didn’t wait to get the reactions that tended our very disastrous performance in the Olympics to issue the statement that I did. After issuing the statement, there were also some people within the sector that got back to me and said I took responsibility for what I shouldn’t. Having said so, I need it to be on record that the first thing that I did after discovering that we were coming home without a medal was to issue that public statement which for me was taking the responsibility of apologising to Nigerians.”
While describing the sports sector as a “work in progress,” and acknowledging both the improvements and setbacks experienced under his leadership, Enoh pointed out that many Nigerians’ reactions towards the sector are rather emotional than rational.
He conceded that the sector has faced a decline over the past few years, and while recent performances were not as strong as hoped, he found some aspects “uplifting.”
“The first is that people need to understand how Nigerians react. A lot of the reactions in this sector are more emotional than rational.”
“For me and for the ministry that I watch over, it remains and will continue to be a work in progress. Bottomline is that I think that our sports in the last couple of years has been in decline and then we have come and though we didn’t do as good as we should do, even though coming after we didn’t get any medal at all, I believe it was kind of very uplifting.”
He cited the recent controversy involving an assistant basketball coach who complained about unpaid wages. Enoh explained that the ministry’s budget only includes provisions for head coaches during international competitions, not for assistant coaches.
“It is the responsibility of the federation to hire its coaches for the different federations. Having said so, when we go for international competitions, the ministry of sports, in doing its budgeting, accommodates the coaches for each of the sports that are competing. There is no accommodation for assistant coaches.”
Reflecting on his tenure, Enoh acknowledged the difficulties of achieving significant results within just one year, comparing his situation to his predecessor, who had two years to prepare for the Olympics. He emphasised that the sector under his leadership has been proactive.
“For me and for the ministry that I watch over, it remains and will continue to be a work in progress. I think that if there is anything to be talked about in being proactive, I think my leadership is very proactive. Unfortunately, try as you can, a few negative exposures will come once in a while.
“I think that it has been quite a revealing one year and at some point, you begin to wonder what can really be achieved substantially in the sports sector in one year. The Olympics have come and gone, very sadly. I was looking at the past Olympics and I was quick to find out that the minister that I took over from had the luxury of spending two years before his own Olympics and I spent just one year. That luxury came because of Covid and the Olympics was moved to 2021. So, it has been quite a lot. It is the nature of this sector that on a daily regular basis, Nigerian men and women are competing in various parts of the world and so the sentiments, the emotions and the feelings of Nigerians. I mean Nigerians always want to win and why not? I have gone to the Olympics and the Paralympics and I sit and watch games and I know how winning is. In terms of prosecution, I think the ministry under my leadership has tried to chew a lot of commitment in terms of sports.”
Chioma Kalu
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