From Tony Osauzo, Benin
Edo State Deaf Sports athletes, yesterday in Benin, protested their exclusion by the Federal Ministry of Youths and Sport Development from the National Sports Festival (NSF), scheduled to hold in Delta State in November this year.
Led by Coach Sunny Aimufua to the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ) complex, the protesters faulted the ministry’s decision to make deaf sport optional as against the parmanent status it enjoyed before now.
“We are here to protest the exclusion of the deaf sports from the forthcoming National Sports Festival (NSF) in Delta in November. It is also unfortunate that the sport has been made optional, which should not be so. You can’t be talking of development when you make a sport optional.
“Also, we have three major sport committees in the world. First is the International Olympic Committee (IOC), International Paralympic Committee and the Committee of Deaf Sports. Now the ministry has favoured the two others while we are being neglected.
“They said a sport becomes optional when there are no facilities for that sports. We must know that Deaf athletics cannot be optional because we have track in most Stadium in Nigeria by able bodied sports men and para athletes, so why won’t there be a place for deaf athletics?
“The ministry should stop playing politics with the deaf sport athletes who are different kind of persons and they need to be encouraged. They have been training and some of them are employed by the states.
“One of our athlete in Edo Assurance Omoria is the African champion in deaf long jump. If she doesn’t participate in the NSF, I would she get better in her career? She was promoted from level five to 12 because of her exploit at the African Championship by Governor Godwin Obaseki based on my recommendation.
“What we want the ministry to do is to restore deaf sport to its parmanent status and ensure that they participate at the NSF in Delta”, Aimufua stated.