Former President of Athletics Federation of Nigeria, AFN, Engr Shehu Ibrahim Gusau’s failure to respond to mails and reminders sent by the Athletics Integrity Unit, AIU,led to Nigeria’s categorisation as a high risk doping nation, documents have revealed.
In November 2018, Gusau was notified that Nigeria has been placed in category B for 2019 after the AIU, under a article 15 of the World Athletics anti-doping rules which categorizes national federations according to their doping risk to the sport.
The categories are A, B and C with A having the highest doping risk to the sport and C the lowest.
This categorisation determines the nature and scope of anti-doping obligations to be imposed on the federation.
After the AIU notified Gusau that Nigeria had been placed in Category B, the then AFN president made no move to ensure the federation’s compliance with its anti-doping obligations as contained in article 15.