By Chibuike Chukwu
Mr Segun Solanke, the Chairman of Provazios Sports, has called for changes across broad in the sports sector in the aftermath of the abysmal performance of Team Nigeria at the just concluded 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, France.
The spots aficionado and entrepreneur, while in a chat on what should be done to halt the decline in Nigerian sports, affirmed that it was high time changes were effected in all strata of sports in the country, saying from the sports ministry to all sports federations, there was the need to consider the interest of the country, calling on the authorities to act now instead of waiting for the next one years before doing something to change the narrative.
The sports stakeholder averred that Senator John Enoh, the Minister of Sports Development, lacked the requisite competence and knowledge to move the sector forward on account of his antecedent which was in full glare at the 2024 Olympic Games.
Solanke said; “The minister might not be good in sports before he got into office but he should know the rudiment to follow to achieve and get the result but he didn’t do anything.
“Nobody may expect him to achieve one hundred percent, but at least he might have achieved something but he failed.
“He definitely doesn’t have the capacity to run the sports sector. Obviously his capacity lies elsewhere and not in the sports sector. They said he is an agriculturist and even at that, I believe he has done well there in administration and management.
“However, what people think is that anybody is capable of managing sports, but it is not like that. This is like me saying because I am good in administration, I should decide to go into medical line, it doesn’t work like that. Certainly I cannot function well if I go there; so everyone of us have where our capacity lies,” he said.
On what President Bola Tinubu should do right now to rejig sports, he said; “It is right to change hand right now than later. It is right to take a decision right now and not waiting again and another one year will be gone.
“At that time, when you want to change hand and bring another person, that person will come with complaints that he doesn’t know what the sports federations are doing.
“Now sports federations are going to have their elections soon; so why are we start changing the sector from up? I mean from the ministry to sports federations and even to NFF and all the other ones.
“Honestly it is time for the expected change to happen at the sports sector across board; we should not wait any further than this time,” he said.
