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Mohammed’s Athens folly
By Nnamdi Okosieme
Reporter,
Covers & Investigation, Lagos
Nigerians eagerly await the return of the Nigerian contingent
to the Athens Olympics which ends on Sunday. Quite a large number of Nigerians
have questions for Nigeria’s Sports Minister, Musa Mohammed, a retired
colonel.
Nigerians want Mohammed to tell them what went wrong in
Athens. They want to know what happened to Nigeria’s projected gold
medals. Last year, in the euphoria of Nigeria’s first ever win of the All
Africa Games, Mohammed gazed into his crystal ball and peremptorily announced
that Nigeria, the proud African giants would haul in 10 gold medals and an
couple of silver and bronze medals at the Athens 2004 Olympics, which was then
less than a year away. A proud President Olusegun Obasanjo lapped it all up,
showering encomiums on the victorious Team Nigeria.
It was easy for Obasanjo to be taken in. At the time of Team
Nigeria’s victory, the President needed cheering news to break the
monotony presented by his confrontation with Adams Oshiomole’s Nigeria
Labour Congress. Mohammed and his lieutenants knew this and massaged his ego.
The truth of the matter however, was that Nigeria was in no position to win
even five gold medals in Athens given the situation as it then existed. What
President Obasanjo did not know, a fact that was hidden by Mohammed and his
subordinates at the sports ministry, was that Nigeria’s victory at the
All Africa Games in Abuja owed more to political manouevering than our
athletes’ prowess in their various events. With Mohammed as the President-
in office at the Supreme Council for Sports in Africa (SCSA) and another
Nigerian, Dr. Awoture Eleyae as secretary general of the body, it was easy for
Nigeria to outwit its two major rivals South Africa and Egypt by craftily
eliminating those events where the two nations had comparative advantage from
the competition roster. Even then Nigerians were on a cliff hanger till the
very end as only a last minute rejection of an Egyptian protest gave Nigeria
overall victory.
It was inevitable that the triumph in Abuja last October
would lull into complacency. Rather than admitting to himself that much still
needed to be done to make Nigeria put up a respectable performance at the
Olympics, Mohammed frittered away valuable time. Rather than pay serious
attention to preparing Nigerian athletes for the games, he adopted a rather
restricted view of role as sports minister.
“ Mohammed conceived his duty as minister purely in
terms of overseeing the activities of the NFA( Nigeria Football Association).
This has been responsible for his constant interference in the affairs of the
body whether on the matter of the appointment of a foreign coach for the Eagles
or in the appointment of a secretary for the professional league. That his job
as minister involves articulating a forward looking strategy to develop sports
in Nigeria is a fact that is lost on Mohammed. The disaster in Athens could
have been avoided if he had been painstaking enough and had held his
subordinates accountable for every kobo earmarked for the games,” said
Tunde Obafemi, a disappointed Nigerian sports fan.
Indeed, the sports minister owes Nigerians not only an
explanation but equally an unreserved apology. Nigeria’s inability to win
the projected gold medals surely rankles Nigerians.It is a known fact that some
of the athletes who failed to perform had no business there as they were
injured. The leadership of the Athletics Federation had insisted that since
those athletes did not take part in the national trials in Abuja, they were out
of the team but Mohammed had over ruled the federation eventually setting
Nigeria up for a fall. More annoying for Mohammed’s compatriots is the
fact that Nigerians competing for other countries won medals for those
countries. Abi Oyepitan and Francis Obikwelu , originally Nigerians won silver
for Britain and Portugal in the women’s 200 metres and the men’s
100 metres respectively. While Oyepitan grew up in Britain, Obikwelu only
changed nationality three years in frustration at the shoddy treatment he was
subjected to while competing for Nigeria. The psychological wound inflicted on
the athlete by the attitude of Nigeria’s sports administrators has yet to
heal and this showed clearly when, Mohammed sent him a congratulatory message
in the wake of his success in the 200 metres event. Responding to a
repoter’s question on a foreign radio station, Obikwelu described
Mohammed’s letter of congratulation as annoying.
“I don’t think I need any letter of
congratulation from Nigerian officials considering that during my time of need
nobody came to my rescue. It sounds funny to me,” Obikwelu said.
Commenting on Nigeria’s poor showing in Athens, he said it was to be
expected considering that “most of the administrators don’t care
about athletes’ welfare and all they think about is how to line their
pockets and take what belongs to athletes”.
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