Former Minister of Sports and Youth Development, Solomon Dalung, on Thursday, lashed out at his successor, Sunday Dare, following Nigeria’s poor outing at the ongoing Olympics Games in Tokyo, Japan.
Lalung accused Dare of elevating his interest above national interest.
Speaking on Arise TV’s ‘The Morning Show,’ the former minister said Dare should take responsibility for the fallouts at the Olympics.
“Leadership is about taking responsibilities. When things go wrong, somebody has to be responsible. The entire drama of shame is unavoidable. National interest was here sacrificed for personal interest, and this is what has brought the state of shame that the country found itself.”
“One should be able to provide the leadership. And the leader here is the minister. He shouldn’t have gone to the level of condescending to the arena to join issues with people that he is supposed to supervise,” Dalung said of the minister’s alleged support for some warring sports administrators in the country.
He accused the minister of dissolving the boards of national sports federations weeks to the Olympics, “thereby disbanding all the officials who had been training the athletes for over two or three years, then bringing onboard another set of people.”
He said where the country found itself at the Olympics was expected as, according to him, no commander-in-chief would disband a general on the eve of an attack by an enemy and win the war.
“When we went to Rio in 2016, I borrowed the sum of N50 million from my friend, Sen. Ifeanyi Uba, before going to Rio. When we got to Rio, it was four days into Olympics that the first tranche for the budget for Olympics was released,” Dalung said, while referring to events that happened while he was in office.
He said the country would have been very embarrassed at the time if he had not taken the measure.
Dalung accused Dare of rejecting PUMA kits scheduled for use at the Olympics because of personal interest, which he said was against national interest.
Also featuring on the TV programme, Vice President of Athletic Federation of Nigeria Sunday Adeleye absolved the federation of any blame from the country’s abysmal outing at the games.
“A lot of people are getting it wrong. The problem is the ministry and the minister of youth and sports. We have issues as a federation, but it has never got to this level. There is no federation in Nigeria today that has no one problem or the other where you have board members having issues, but it has never gotten to this level.
“The minister of sports has taken sides, even when the Federal High Court of Nigeria has said he should stay away from the business of athletics. He appealed that judgment, and the Court of Appeal in Abuja also said he should stay away. But the man is saying he is going to destroy some certain people because he has a problem with them.”
Rejecting PUMA and its kits, Dare had said he would not be part of a contract shrouded in secrecy.
“The Ministry steered clear of the clouds over the Puma kits and went for local content as directed under the local content law of Nigeria. Ministry and AFN went for a local garment producer to kit Team Nigeria,” a statement from the ministry over the kits read in part.
But Adeleye showed documents allegedly signed by the ministry, giving the federation the nod to seek sponsorship, which it went on to seal with PUMA.
Adeleye, however, said rather than being blamed, the AFN deserved commendation for its efforts.
He also called on President Muhammadu Buhari to carry out a shake-up in the ministry.
Following Nigeria’s failure to use the kits at the Olympics, PUMA terminated its four-year deal with the country on August 4.
Meanwhile, Special Adviser to the incumbent Minister on Media John Akanji questioned the success of Dalung when he was in his office while speaking with our reporter.
“Where were his achievements when he was in office?
“What was his role in the PUMA kit that is creating ripples all over the place? If he has a conscience, let him tell you the role he played in this PUMA saga. I will not dignify him with a response because we will come out with a clear-cut fact as to what transpired.”
Akanji said his team would assemble facts on the ministry’s position to let Nigerians know who lied.
“The question to ask the minister is what were his achievements when he was in office? Dalung was the one that said the federation should be autonomous, a ministry that the Federal Government funds, a ministry still representing Nigeria should be autonomous? Should we collect money from the Federal Government and remain autonomous and not accountable for the funds collected from the government?
“There are a lot of fundamental questions that people are not asking Dalung.”
He said Dalung wanted the federation to prevent the minister from questioning its operations.
The aide also opposed the description of Nigeria’s outing in Tokyo as a failure.
“You called two medals a failure? In the past, we never won anything. If you call it a failure, I disagree with that word failure,” he told the reporter.
Nigeria got its medals in Tokyo through Ese Brume and Blessing Oborodudu.
Brume claimed bronze after finishing third in the women’s long jump event on August 3, and Oborodudu won a silver in the 68kg wrestling event – becoming the first Nigerian to win a wrestling medal at the Games.
Ten Nigerian athletes were disqualified from participating in the Olympics because of non-compliance with the Out of Competition Testing (OCT) requirement.
The disqualification resulted in a protest by the athletes in Tokyo.
Dare had boasted his delegation was not in Tokyo for a show, but to win laurels.
Nigeria’s total laurels since 1952 that it first took part in the Olympics are 25.
The country has won three golds, 10 silvers and 12 bronzes.
