Just over a month after the 2022 National Sports Festival ended in Delta State, a monumental gold-for-cash fraud by some dubious states and sports ministry officials is rocking the national sports showpiece, ANTHONY NLEBEM reports
Bayelsa maintained second-place with 285 medals: 104 gold, 101 silver and 80 bronze, while Edo remained third with 304 medals: 75 gold, 87 silver and 142 bronze.
On likely sanctions for individuals and states found guilty, Ibitoye added, “Let the ministry find out first and discover where the mistake came from. The Director of the National Sports Festival said that there were some changes to how medals were scored in some sports. Let them conclude their investigation and come out with those corrections and the sports ministry will pick it up from there.
Another stakeholder said, “Let us just take it that we never had a sports festival. Can you believe that a state had 27 gold medals on the last day, and all of a sudden, it was manipulated to 41 gold. Now, for the rest of us, they made sure they didn’t release our medals on time, so they could manipulate the results.”confirmed that Team Lagos were sent an adjusted ‘final medals table’ where they were awarded extra medals.
“We protested through a letter because we knew the number of gold medals Ondo won, we knew that we did not win nine gold medals. The General Manager of the Ondo State Sports Council wrote a letter of complaint to the organisers, which I am aware of. We did what we needed to do and in the end, we won only six gold medals.
Asked during an interview on radio if officials engaged in the fraudulent to get more money from their states on their return home, the retired general stated, “Of course, that’s the reason. Some will even get promoted, that the state did very well. That’s what happens.” “It makes me feel bad, because it is only when the leadership in the Technical Committee is weak, that things like that can happen. If you put your foot down, such things will never happen because I’m always with my computer looking at the medals table as they come in and we release them as at when due. I think it boils down to the Technical Committee, the leadership cannot stamp its authority on its subordinates.
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