Following complaints regarding the medals table following the most recent National Sports Festival (NSF) in Asaba, Delta State, the Ministry of Youth and Sports Development has decided to form a committee to launch an immediate review.
There have been concerns about purported results padding from a plethora of sources, with several states arguing that the total results cannot match the final medals table.
The ministry said in a statement on Sunday that the evaluation was necessary to identify any difficulties with the festival’s medals table computation.
“Accordingly, the ministry has appointed a five-man committee made up of experts who had managed the technical arm of previous sports festivals,” the statement reads.
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“Brig. Gen. Emmanuel Okaro will be the chairman of the committee, which also has Mrs Hauwa-Kulu Akinyemi and Madaki Elias Gora as members. A representative of the Delta State Sports Commission will serve as member while Lekan Alabi, the statistician of the ministry, will be secretary.”
According to the statement, using its knowledge and experience from prior festivals, the committee, which has seven days to present its report, will ascertain what went wrong with the computation of the medals table.
The committee would establish the precise and accurate medals table by eliminating any double entries and inaccuracies, and it would also provide recommendations to prevent similar occurrences in the future.
Meanwhile, the Rivers State sports commissioner, Barrister Chris Green, has called on the committee to be transparent during a radio programme anchored by ace sports broadcaster, Mr Godwin Enakhena, in Lagos.
“First of all, the independent committee should come clean because the conduct of everything was worrisome and we kept informing that this is not right; collation was not done at the due time, results were not released at the due time, even the persons that were given that responsibility were not the usual persons that we used to know in the past. One started to wonder why all of these. The good news is that these persons are not only ill-equipped but are not experienced in the beat, so at the end of the day, we know that these are going to happen,” he said.
It will be recalled that with 320 gold, 200 silver, and 128 bronze medals, TeamDelta emerged champions at the just-concluded Delta2022 National Sports Festival.
By Jide Olusola and Dotun Omisakin, Lagos