…Seeks more investment in science & technology
CHIGOZIE AMADI
A Chieftain of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP), Ambassador Olufemi Ajadi Oguntoyinbo, has lamented the failure of Nigeria’s contingent at the just-concluded 2024 Paris Olympics to clinch any medals despite huge financial commitment by the government.
He described nation’s expenditure of over N12 billion on the just-concluded 2024 Paris Olympics as ‘wastage’.
Ajadi recalled that Nigeria fielded 88 athletes in 12 sports in Paris and ended up without a medal, the eighth time the country would suffer the same fate in 19 appearances at the multi-sport event since making its debut at the 1952 edition in Helsinki.
He said the amount that was invested was painful because there were no results to show for it, adding that it is almost two times the amount of the country’s entire budget for the Ministry of Science and Technology this year.
Ajadi has, therefore, called on the Federal government to probe the cause of this wastage and failure, urging the Federal Government to focus more on Science and Technology development as they are doing on sports.
Ajadi, who was the Ogun State NNPP gubernatorial candidate in the last general election in a statement on Thursday, expressed his displeasure with the Nigeria team’s inability to clinch a single medal despite the huge financial investment into the game.
He noted that sports as one of the unifying tools irrespective of tribes, religious or political affiliations not only in Nigeria but globally, the officials should always come clean in selecting the country’s athletes.
According to him, “We fielded 88 athletes in 12 sports with N12bn in Paris and ended up without a medal, this is over N136 million (about $85,000) spent on each of the 88 Nigerian contingents to the Olympics, and no singular medal was won.
“While Jamaica, a nation which spent far less than we did, a total of about $2300 on each contingent, won six medals; one Gold, three Silver and two Bronze at the Olympics. We must now question how we made this huge investment, without getting any returns.
“The general impression that comes with the Olympic’s outcome is the one that portrays our country as a joker, even on the international stage. It is very difficult to explain that many African countries that spent less and with little contingent came back to the continent with medals.
“Now that the Paris Olympics 2024 has officially ended and Team Nigeria, despite the huge financial investment made into the project, returned without a single medal, amounts to wastage.
“Let me call on the Federal Government to institute a probe into the performance of our 88 contingent to the Olympics. I want to register my displeasure with the recklessness and shoddy preparation for the Olympics leading to wastage of over N12billion. Wasting this amount under our present state of the economy is something we cannot swept under the carpet.
Ajadi described the reckless removal of Favour Ofili’s name from the 100 metres Team by some officials despite training for the Olympics as scandalous.
“The reckless removal of Favour Ofili’s name from the 100 Meter race by some officials is an indication that we didn’t prepare well for the game. Let us consider the case of Favour Ofili, a Nigerian professional sprinter, who trained for years for the 2024 Olympics, only for her name to be recklessly and wrongly removed from the list of athletes for the 100metre race at the Olympics by Nigerian sporting authorities.
“We should be able to do away with sentiments, favouritism in the process of selecting our athletes. What shows that we are unserious nation was the fact that many of our country men and women represented other countries at the Olympics and came out in flying colours, why are they not part of our contingent, some expressed their readiness to fly Nigeria colour but they were denied.
“As we should take our sports more seriously, I want to also implore government to invest more in Science and Technology as this will also bring to the country more developments.
“Enough of this Jamboree, government must do all it can to invest in technological developments. The budget for the Ministry of Science and Technology as well as that of Education should be jerked up in the next year budget”, Ajadi said.
