Mixed reactions are trailing the performance of the Muhammadu Buhari Administration in sports in the last eight years under two ministers__ Solomon Dalung and Sunday Dare__ who served for four years each. MORAKINYO ABODUNRIN and OLALEKAN OKUSAN report.
Under the Muhammadu Buhari Administration, two sports ministers – Solomon Dalung and Sunday Dare – took charge of the Ministry of Youth and Sports Development and both made efforts to lift the fortunes of sports amid inherent challenges associated with the sector. In 2015, before Buhari appointed Dalung after more than six months in office, sports was in a near comatose state with no clear direction, but with the emergence of the Plateau state-born lawyer, things began to take shape as Nigeria featured in several international tournaments, including the Rio 2016 Olympic Games in Brazil.
Under Dalung, Nigeria won more medals from different international sporting competitions than any other period in Nigeria’s sports history. Yet the Dalung era would also be remembered for its litany of controversies, including poor preparation towards the Rio 2016 Olympic Games as well as late arrival of kits to the games and general poor welfare of the athletes, which accounted for Team Nigeria’s poor outing. There was also the heated World Athletics $135,000 that was mistakenly transferred to the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) and despite being informed of wrongful transaction, greater sum of the money was not repaid until Dalung left office.
In his second term in office, President Buhari replaced Dalung with Sunday Dare, a veteran journalist who served as the Executive Commissioner, Stakeholder Management of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) before his ministerial appointment. Dare’s arrival was like the breath of fresh air as he brought dynamism to the hitherto convulsed ministry. Observers believe the Oyo State-born minister brought in increased funding, new sponsors, new initiatives, new programmes, and a robust national sports industry policy to the sports sector, thus inspiring a new generation of young athletes, coaches and sports administrators.
In his appraisal of Buhari’s achievements in sports, United States-based Sadiq Abdullahi recalled that the country has had 15 sports ministers since the return to democracy in 1999. Despite several giant strides made under Dalung, Abdullahi noted that Dare added vigour to the sports sector with several initiatives. “Sunday Dare is considered one of the most progressive ministers as evidenced by his determination to improve sports infrastructure, athletes’ welfare, grassroots sports, and commitment to make national sports federations functional, accountable, transparent, and professional,” the Professor who played tennis at international level for the country in his heyday, told Nation Sport. “At inception in May 2019, Dare announced his four cardinal principles that will frame his agenda of sports reform: sports infrastructure, grassroots sports, athletes’ welfare and sports as business.”
Highlighting the giant strides in sports, Abdullahi quipped: “It can be concluded that Buhari with Dalung and Dare as ministers have contributed significantly to sports development and improvement. No president and sports ministers before them have done so well to improve sports infrastructure, grassroots sports, athletes’ welfare, and sports as business.”
National sports industry policy
Indeed, Dare’s stewardship in four years under the Buhari administration was markedly different. Pivotal was the approval of the National Sports Industry Policy (NSIP) otherwise known as Sports as Business by the Federal Government. Accordingly, the NSIP is developed to increase private participation in sports development through investments and government incentives.
Equally important was the novel Adopt Initiative that included: adopt-an-athlete; adopt-a-pitch; adopt-a-team and adopt-a-facility. These interventions were not only novel, but they also partly addressed the welfare of elite athletes as well as maintenance of infrastructure to a certain degree. In fact, the adopt-a-facility saw to the revamping of the Moshood Abiola National Stadium after almost 10 years of lack of proper maintenance through a robust public private partnership. It also catered for the renovation of the National Stadium in Surulere, Lagos, which had hitherto suffered abandonment for almost two decades.
Under the adopt-an-athlete initiative, direct financial support was channelled to the accounts of foreign and home-based Nigeria athletes. Over 50 Nigerian athletes got direct funding to the tune of over half a million dollars. The Buhari administration also birthed a 10-year football master plan towards rebuilding youth football and rejuvenating the domestic national league. Also in conjunction with the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), the ministry put in place the rebuilding of the Nigeria Premier Football League (NPFL) currently on-going under the IMC set up by the Ministry. Yet Dr Kweku Tandoh, former Executive Chairman, Lagos State Sports Commission, said despite the strides under the Buhari administration, there are still a lot yet to be desired.
National Sports Commission framework
“In the first two years (2015-2017) of the administration, sports operated under the National Sports Commission (NSC) framework and thereafter, in 2017, it went back to the Ministry of Youths and Sports framework. There is no doubt that for sports to operate in the professional space, the appropriate framework is the NSC. There are so many reasons and benefits for the re-establishment of the NSC but suffice to say that this is the way to go for Nigeria’s sports development. The other aspects of the Governance Structure/Framework include the National Olympic Committee and the National Sports Federations. It can said that the desired synergy between these organs of the Sports Governance Framework has not yet been achieved. Tandoh agreed that in terms of sports policy, progress were made under in the Buhari years, adding that the reclassification of sports as a business was a bright light since sports had always been treated with levity.
“Following from this reclassification was the adoption of the National Sports Industry Policy (NSIP), which will fast-track the synergy and partnership between government and the corporate sector towards sports development and sports business. However, for the Sports Policy to achieve its objectives there must be synergy between the Federal Government and the State Governments, as they must align on the contents of the NSIP.”
Nevertheless, he lamented that funding was still a major issue under the Buhari administration and insisted that sustainable funding that would capture development, competitions and capacity building was needed. “Under this administration, funding for sports was a major issue, like it had always been with past governments,” he said.
“Even when the funding came, it was usually at the wrong time. Government funding for sports is still competition-driven rather than being developmental-driven and as a result, funds for major competitions leave no room for its application for training and development because it usually comes late.”
Tandoh, who was Secretary General of the highly successful Eko 2012 National Sports Festival, also scored the admiration low on the general state of sports infrastructure across the country as well as capacity building of sports personnel. “In terms of construction and provision of new sports facilities, this administration did not do much. Added to this is the very poor record in maintenance of the existing Federal Government sports facilities. Most of them are in a very poor state and even the efforts at involving the private sector in maintenance of sports facilities have been so limited.
“If the Federal Government cannot maintain its sports facilities, perhaps other options such as concession and even outright privatisation should be considered. Also, there was little efforts at training and retraining of sports administrators, coaches and even athletes. Without well trained sports administrators, coaches, scouts, athletes, no sports development plan or strategy will succeed,” he noted.
Different strokes from different federations
But former youth international, Paul Okoku, who starred for the Flying Eagles in the 1980s, described sports with particular reference to football under the Buhari administration as a mixed bag of successes and failures. “Most notable Nigeria’s achievement was under Dalung and that was the qualification for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia, though the Super Eagles like in 2002 and 2010 failed to go beyond the group phase,” the U.S.-based Okoku noted.“
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Before then, the Eagles had failed to qualify for the 2015 and 2017 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) and they only finished third in the 2019 edition. But Under Dare, football had few things to cheer about despite the Super Eagles missing out of the Qatar 2022 FIFA World Cup – the first Mundial to be hosted in the Middle East. Both the national U-17 and U-20 soccer teams won the sub-regional football tournaments to secure qualifications for their continental equivalents. While the women’s U-20 team clinched bronze medal at the FIFA World Cup, the men’s U-20 team secured qualification for the on-going FIFA World Cup in Argentina.
“Frankly, I’m not impressed with the administration’s scorecard in football because much was not done to improve domestic leagues. Support for European football leagues has engulfed the entire country at the expense of our national economies. The football administrators are reportedly embezzling government and private funds and resources with impunity.
“Since there’s no accountability, private investors, companies and individuals have deliberately stayed away from sponsorship of the domestic league for instance because there’s no return on investment (ROI). In other words, football is a business as far as Nigerian football is concerned,” he added.
Poor handling of federation elections
Okoku further chided the administration for poor handling of federation elections, notably those of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) and Nigeria Basketball Federation (NBBF), which led to long running battles under both Dalung and Dare. Despite the seemingly lack of order at the administrative levels, athletics, basketball as well as wrestling federations recorded milestones under the Buhari-led government.
Aside the relative success from the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, the country claimed a silver medal in wrestling for the first time at the delayed Tokyo 2020 Olympics through Blessing Oborodudu; while Ese Brume also claimed a bronze medal in the long jump event in Tokyo too. The country also achieved its best performance in years from the 2022 World Athletics Junior Championships held in Kenya where the contingent came third with impressive medal haul, which included four gold, three silver, and four bronze. Of course in Tobi Amusan, Nigeria produced her first-ever world champion as the Ogun State-born athlete broke the World Record in the 100 meters hurdles at the 2022 World Athletics Championships in the United States.
Good news from Birmingham Commonwealth Games
Nigeria also finished as the best performing African country for the first time at the 22nd Commonwealth Games in Birmingham where Team Nigeria came 7th overall out of 62 countries with an impressive haul of 35 medals, including 12 gold medals. “Despite the successes recorded at the Commonwealth Games and other international championships, the chaos that characterised election into the sports federation elections under this regime since 2017 was a major low,” Okoku said.
Among the federations rocked by major crisis was the AFN, NBBF; two major sports, apart from football. “The government through the Ministry of Youth and Sports Development has a running battle with Ibrahim Gusau in the AFN. The drama in the NBBF was Nollywood-styled as elections produced two presidents on two occasions. First under Dalung and yet again under Dare despite laid down guidelines for the exercise.
“The squabble in both federations dragged on for years with Dalung accused of taking sides and it took the intervention of FIBA had to intervene at some point. The scorecard of sports under Buhari in the last eight years is neither here nor there. While athletics and basketball appeared to be the biggest gainers, football was the opposite. What appears to be the gain was indeed like a mirage because it was as a result of the patriotic zeal of the athletes rather the bye-products of structure put in place by the government.”
In the same vein, Bolaji Douglas, the defensive stalwart of the BBC Lions of Gboko that won the rested Africa Cup Winners’ Cup in 1995, also scored the Buhari administration low in sports. Though he lauded some of lofty programmes and initiatives under the outgoing Dare who came into office in 2019, he miffed over failed promises.
“I think the stewardship of this administration in sport was a mixture of gains and dashed hopes,” he said.
“I think commendations must go to the administration for trying to renovate some of the stadiums. The re-grassing of the Abuja stadium is one. While so much noise was made about the National stadium in Lagos, I think the reality on the ground is bigger than the drive the minister had in mind.”
Super Eagles failure
Douglas frowned at Nigeria’s unimpressive performance at the Olympics under the Buhari administration and he lamented D’Tigress’ failure to play at the last FIBA World Cup, despite qualifying due to the friction within the Nigeria Basketball Federation family then. He said that action would forever haunt the outgoing administration. Ditto the Super Eagles’ failure to qualify for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, which would forever remain indelible, according to Douglas.
“We went to the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and the result was no different from what we have been trying for decades to improve. The nation missing out on the FIBA Women’s World Cup because of the inability of the ministry to resolve the internal wrangling within the association was a big dent on the administration because the poor players who toiled so hard to qualify could only watch as their dreams went down the drain.
“The football fans were not spared either. The Super Eagles failure to secure a ticket for Qatar is another big dent. Even though the ministry is not directly in charge of football, nevertheless that failure would always reflect badly on the administration. Football generally both men and women fell below the standards we have set by our past results in the game.”
He, however, applauded some of good accomplishments under the outgoing administration, including winning the 2015 FIFA U17 World Cup in Chile and Tobi Amusan’s impressive stats in the 100m hurdles among others. But former Super Falcons coach, Kadiri Ikhana, who was instrumental to Enyimba International FC of winning the country first and only CAF Champions League Trophy till date, said sports was nothing to write home about under the outgoing administration of Buhari while praying that the administration of President-elect, Bola Tinubu, brings good tidings for sports in the coming years.
“I will say sport is dead in the country. Football is the sport that I know. What have been our results in almost eight years? It has been one disappointment or the other. We won the Under 17 World Cup in 2015, but it can’t be credited to them because it was just a new administration as at then. What have we achieved afterwards? The Golden Eaglets, Flying Eagles and other teams all failed at major competitions. Some of them fell during the qualifiers,” a frank Ikhana disclosed.