Institutions let down Team Nigeria athletes in Paris – Abdullahi

A former minister of sports, Bolaji Abdullahi, has said that the Nigerian sporting ecosystem failed Team Nigeria at the just-concluded 2024 Paris Olympic Games.

In an exclusive chat, Abdullahi said athletes naturally always want to win as their sports are sources of livelihood for them and their families.

“The institution was important. It’s almost always due to factors outside the sports when we fail. Not the sports. Not the athletes themselves.

It’s always having to do with something extraneous, politics around it, people fighting themselves, people not wanting to work together, people sabotaging one another. Don’t be surprised the Ofili story could be sabotaged,” he said.

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While reacting to reports that the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) could overlook Ofili and seek new talents, Abdullahi said the Olympics is for elite athletes not for inter-house sports winners.

“The Olympics is the highest level of human competition on earth. When you say something is impossible, it is at the Olympics that human beings go to prove that it is possible. That is where men go to become gods. So it’s not a place you go and try your best. They know their global ranking. They know their continental ranking.

“We should stop this fixation. Unfortunately, the only way we measure success at the Olympics is by how many medals you can bring. But for these athletes, we should celebrate them for what they can achieve. If an athlete can run his season best, right, it is something,” he said.

He also stated that athletes don’t belong to the sports ministry but to the various federations that select those to represent the country.

“The federations will pick the athletes.  It’s the federation that are in charge of that. The athletes don’t belong to us. We don’t have business with the athletes. It’s the federations that own the athletes,” he said.