Tag: Wrestling

Hon. Daniel Igali needs no introduction when it comes to sports in Nigeria. The Nigeria Wrestling Federation president was among the five delegates of the International Federation of Associated Wrestling Styles (Fila) that made presentation to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that voted in favour of reinstating Wrestling in its games for the 2020 and 2024 Olympics. In this chat with SportingLife’ AKEEM LAWAL shortly after returning from the World Wrestling Championship in Hungary,the Olympic gold medalist reveals  what Nigeria tends to gain from the IOC decision, his plans for the federation amongst other issues. Excerpts: 

Welcome back from the World Wrestling Championship in Hungary to start with, why was Nigeria not represented at the championship?

I just returned from Budapest on Sunday where I went to watch the World

Championships. Unfortunately our team could not make it, we were to present three athletes, Iheanacho Ifeoma at 67kg, Blessing Oburududu at 63 kg and Adekuroye Odunayo at 51kg, but we did not get visas. We did apply slightly over two weeks before the tournament and did not get visas. So it’s something I do plan to get to the root of because while I was in Budapest, I saw Congo, Guinea Bissau, Senegal, Cameroun, all of them were there. So why Nigeria should not get visas to attend this kind of championship worries me greatly especially since I’m the president of the federation now.

Why it also bother me is because when people ask me what my biggest regret has ever been in sports, or my saddest moment in sports, I tell them it was in 1992 when I was supposed to go to an Olympic qualifier in Senegal. I had already made weight but I was dropped here at the Muritala Mohammed Airport because there was no money.

In this case we even had funds to go but we couldn’t get visas. So I can appreciation and understand how the athletes feel. For me, it’s about the athletes and one of the things I’ve always looked at especially for the coming Olympics is that most of the athletes who will represent us should go for about three world championships. Then we can begin to rate and rank them and eventually know where we can place them in 2016.

So for them not to have been able to go to this championship, for me it’s very troubling. While I know it was never going to happen is because we should start every process at least six weeks before, but irrespective of that, I still want to get to the root of this to know exactly why the athletes were refused visas.

You said the federation applied early, does the refusal has anything to do with political issues, or is it that they fear Nigeria attending some of these competitions?

I think we also have to keep our house in order and that is one of the things we really have to checkmate because all fairness to the NOC president, he was very involved in this process. In fact he even moved to Abuja and stayed there for about three days to intercede and get in touch with the embassy, it was the Slovakian Embassy that was responsible because we don’t have an Hungarian Embassy here. He also recounted to me the problem he had before, where they were supposed to go to a championship and they didn’t have visas and he even involved the minister of foreign affairs and when the ambassador was called, the ambassador told them they just issued visas to about five people a week earlier going to the same competition. That is why I want to really get to the bottom of this because we hit a brick wall. My brother, Dr Godknows Igali who is a former ambassador and permanent secretary of power at the federal level also wrote letters to the ambassador who spent his personal time. So we were very sure that we were going to get visas, but somehow we were rebutted. I need to really know what may have happened so that I can also checkmate it from my end for next time.

What is in the federation’s calendar for athletes in the little part left this year?

Next month we have a competition in Egypt the ‘Mustapha International’ and we intend to send about three or four athletes to that Championship. Then we also have a competition in Rio de Jenero in the last week of November, we are going to send a decent team there. We also have the Commonwealth Championships from December 5 to 9 in Johannesburg and you know we have the Commonwealth Games next year. So my plan is to send a full team to Commonwealth Championship because by then we’ll have a gage at how well we can do at the Commonwealth Games. We also have a junior festival (National Sports Festival for junior athletes) that is put together by the National Sports Commission in early November. We will also be having Governor

Dickson Wrestling Classic in Bayelsa in November. So we now have about five tournaments that we still have a chance to go to which in my mind will be able to adequately prepare our athletes for the coming season next year.

Do we still have such athletes who performed at the past competitions such as the All Africa Games competing at their top form or are you looking at ways to replace them?

We have less than half of the ones we had before. We have a few younger athletes which means we need enough time to groom and develop them. There are some older athletes too who have some experience but what we have been talking about for a long time is that they need wrestling experience and that is why the competitions are crucial. If you go to about three to four tournaments this year and we go to about three tournaments next year before the Commonwealth Games, I will be sitting down really comfortably knowing that we are going to compete effectively.

Now you have to understand that at the Commonwealth, you have two superpowers, Canada and India and I think the India is even the Super Power in wrestling now than Canada. India won a silver and a bronze at the Commonwealth Championship in freestyle at 65kg . At 65kg he should have won, but he lost on criteria. So it was 2-2 between him and Iran and they said he was a bit more passive and that was why they gave it to Iran. There is also a 74kg from India that should have medal, he wrestled for bronze and lost the bronze medal match. So out of seven athletes, you have three of them wrestling in the semi finals, that is a super power in wrestling. They were in the top 10 nations in the world. So we have our work really cut out for us at the Commonwealth level and this is not because it just started this year, India has been putting up a wrestling programme for the past 10 years with Russian coaches, with the budget of over a million dollars for more than ten years and that is why they are getting to this point now.

Looking at the technical area, is the federation planning to bring in a foreign technical adviser before the Commonwealth Games next year?

The issue of competences of technical staff also has to do with exposure. If you expose your technical staff, they become world class. But if they are not going to competitions, if they are relegated to Nigeria, then you are going to have sub power technical officials. Everybody on our technical staff is an African champion or has competed at the Commonwealth level, so they are pretty much up to speed. But as you know, there are some more experienced technical expert that we have in other parts of the world. If we really need to up our level of performance, I think we will need some help with one or two technical people that will come and assist the ones the already have. I’m one person who believes in the competences of our people, I’m one person who believes in encouraging our people. I don’t think there is any technical official from any other country that will have the same passion or zeal or more than we have in Nigeria. So there must be a blend if we are bringing in anybody, there must be a blend between that and Nigerian content.

If we are to bring in anyone, are we looking at Canada or Egypt?

I will not go for Egypt necessarily, if we have a competent person sure, but now we are looking at United State, Canada, Russia, Cuba, Bulgaria.

But we must also look for someone who will come here and be able to fit into the Nigerian system. I don’t want to have someone who comes here and within a month says he can’t handle it and goes back, then you start afresh. So for me it’s something we need to look at, sit down, analyse and look for someone who can really do the job, who will take it up as a project not

someone who will be coming for a paycheck. But someone who will say if I do this I’m going to have a profile at the higher level.

Assuming you get one and the person is ready to come to Nigeria, does the federation have the resources to fund it, or are you looking forward to government?

I wouldn’t want to move ahead of what the minister will announce, but there are very robust plans for a rebranding sports system in Nigeria. In the discussions we had, we have brushed the idea of how this people will be funded. I think it will be better left for the National Sports Commission to give more insight into that, but it won’t be wrestling federation. As it stands now, we don’t have those kinds of finances in the federation. We are working towards it; we are looking at working with different partners to see how we can be a little bit more robust in funding with funds from the federation.

You just came back from Budapest and saw some of the coaches there, did you contact any of them?

Yes I had some very robust discussions, I won’t disclose names or countries now, but I had some discussions with people who I think may need to come to Nigeria and see the conditions here first before they make up their minds. There is one thing to be far away and look and something and say, well I want to do that and there is another thing to come somewhere and really be there for a week and see if you can be able to handle it. So over the next couple of weeks, there will be a lot of legwork going on with respect to who will come to assist us especially when the NSC is ready to move ahead in that direction.

As a former wrestler and an Olympic gold medalist, how will you rate our wrestlers worldwide?

You know there was a lot of hullabaloo just recently about the track and field and how they had not won any medal at the World Championship for 14 year. Well, in wrestling, we won a Bronze medal at the World Championship in 2009, we also won a bronze medal in 2010. In 2011, we wrestled in the semi finals and also wrestled for a bronze, losing the bronze match at the world Championships. So we have athletes who are at that level. If you win a bronze medal at the World Championships, you can win the gold medal, on a good day. If you wrestle for bronze and you lose at the World Championships, you can win a medal on a good day. So I would say we have athletes who, given the necessary support, can win medal in Nigeria right now. But it has to do with consistency, it has to be consistent. if you look at the Super Eagles, every month they are playing a friendly match, it’s not just because they want to play, but it if because they want to get that match fitness, get idea of how to play together and it’s the same for every other sport especially in wrestling, you must compete. A few year ago, Mongolia was nowhere in wrestling, now Mongolia would have won the whole World Championship for women. They started about eight years ago, got new coaches, got a robust budget for wrestling and they are more focused on women and they were second in the world. They won four medals out of seven. So those are the kind of things we need to do and I knew Mongolia was going to do well because every competition you go, Mongolia is there. And what happen even with FILA, our parent body is, if such a country and a country that is not regular is competing in a competition and there is a tie, Mongolia will get it because they are supporting FILA . That is what we need to start doing in Nigeria. I want to be at every championships, I want to be in the US, Iran, Germany, Russia, I want my athletes to be competing about ten times a year internationally. If we start doing that, before you know it, they’ve wrestled everybody in their weight class, if they lose the first time, the second time they could win it.

At the National Sports Festival, you see some athletes dumping wrestling for another sport. Is it that it is not a very reliable source of livelihood or what?

This was because of this rule that says athletes can only feature at the Sports Festival three times. You know there was much pressure on the sports councils for some of those athletes. Lots of them were sacked because sports council employs you to perform for them at the festival,not for any championship. So once you are ineligible, you are out of the system. And some of them were ineligible as early as 20 year of age. This is because they went to the first festival at the age of 16, the second one at 18 and the third one at 20 and they were done, they became useless goods to the sports councils. So you have to either go and do other sports to be relevant and be useful or they will do away with you. And if we are now talking of an athlete who we are looking forward to go to the World Championship or the Olympics to do well who has now left wrestling to go and do weightlifting, then what are we talking about. That is why I was one of the advocate for Open Festival and I’m happy that it is open. If the festival is our Olympics, then why will you debar anybody from competing at it? If an athlete is 90 years old somebody should beat them. If you can’t beat them, then let them remain there. So we’ve done that now and in Calabar it’s going to be Open which I think is one of the best things we’ve done to sports. In fact there are no competitions for these so called elite athletes. In some federations, there are no competitions for two years and it’s only the festival. This is because most federations can’t fund championships because they are expensive. Sports generally is expensive, it’s not cheap. That is one of the things I commend the minister on. For having the courage to go against the tide because it was a hot button issue. A lot of states were opposed to it and he put down his foot and insists that this is what he want to do and that is what I like about people with guts.

If you look at it, from 1991 that we had this system, how have we faired as a country in sports. Nigeria should not be happy for winning one bronze medal at the Olympics, that is not success. From 1991 if you look at the records we had internationally, we’ve not really had any records aside 1996 where we had two performances that were unexpected and we rested on our hoarse. But I do believe we are getting to a point that things will change.

Talking about your presentation in Argentina, beyond this sport coming back to the Olympics, what do we stand to gain in wrestling?

Obviously if you are not part of the Olympics you are not in the Olympic movement. I think that is the biggest thing we stand to gain. Firstly, that you will be funded by the federal government. Secondly you have young athletes who will now be saying I want to go to the Olympics. The Olympics is our professional sports, a soccer player wants to play professionally, in England, Germany or Italy, that is his goal. A basketball player’s goal is not to go to the Olympics, it’s to play in NBA. Somebody who plays hockey’s goal is to make it in the NHL. In wrestling, what you want to do is to go to the Olympics. I think that is the biggest thing that we’ve gained. If you want to talk about specific games that Nigerian wrestling will make, I will like to give kudos to the governor of Bayelsa State who wrote a lot of letters to the IOC, to the FILA president and essentially sponsored all my activities around the world for this campaign. Because we were so front and center of this, we now have a one-on-one relationship with the leadership of FILA. I can call the FILA president, Nenad Lalovic now and he will pick up the call and talk to me.

Bayelsa State is building a state of the art gym dedicated for wrestling only. When I told him about it, he promised to donate all the mats that the gym will need from FILA and that we should let him know when it will be commissioned as he will not be opposed to be there personally himself.

So we now have that relationship with FILA which will make things a lot easier for Nigeria because that is the highest level you can go. If you have any issues, and you have somebody who can call the president directly and iron them out, I think that is what you want in sports and fortunately this gave us that opportunity. I knew Lalovic but I didn’t have that kind of relationship with him. But having been with him in St Petersburg for over a week and in Buenos Aires for almost two weeks, everyday, morning to night, going to lunch, dinners, practicing our speeches together, we are now very close, we have a good chemistry. It’s not just with him, it’s also with the FILA bureau, we have over 20 members of the bureau and I now know every one of them. Most of the top referees, most of the sponsors of wrestling, I know a lot of them, I think that has given us a lot more advantages.