- Distances self from Ministry
From Romanus Ugwu, Abuja
Barely 48 hours after the Sports federations election in Abuja, Nigeria Olympic Committee (NOC) Secretary General, Tunde Popoola, has declared that the NOC did not play a major role in the election, insisting that the poll did not meet international best practices.
Speaking with Daily Sun Sports in Abuja after the election, Popoola said that the election was conducted without federation constitution, clearance letters, and guideline from the NOC and from the Olympic Charter.
In his words: “Let me make it clear that elections are naturally to be conducted by the federations on their own at their own time. We all know the story of how we got to this extent. Federations were not straight forward when it comes to the issue of drawing up their constitutions and using them.
“In actual fact, the election yesterday (tuesday) was not conducted by the NOC but we were invited to supervise. It is not also the federations that conducted the election but the ministry. I can authoritatively tell you that election must not be like this and this will be the last time this kind of election will be conducted in the manner of gathering every federation.
“We have made it clear to the Ministry that this will be the last time we will conduct election that will not meet international best practices. We have equally told the federations to urgently draw up their constitution following the normal processes.
“Most of the federations did not comply with the directive for them to summit their constitution with the exception of about five of them like basketball, boxing, rugby, tennis.
“The international best practice was not what we are doing now because the federations did not make use of a constitution duly approved by the congress, the international federations and deposited with the NOC.” in conducting these elections.
“None of the federations received any letter and guideline from the NOC from the Olympic Charter with the code of ethics stating how to go about it concerning the election,” he said.