Reps probe Dalung over funds utilization demand postponement of sports federation’s elections
The House of Representatives has called on the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports to postpone the planned elections into the boards of the national sports federations.
The House also demanded that the ministry should recall all members of the boards of the various sports federations that were recently dissolved.
Adopting a motion by Rep Ayodeji Adebayo Joseph (APC, Lagos), the House mandated the committee on sports to investigate the role of the ministry in interfering and issuing the guidelines for elections into the sports federations.
The committee was further mandated to investigate the sports minister, Solomon Dalung, to ascertain the status of all funds allocated to the various sports federations in the last two years. The committee has three weeks to report back to the House on its findings.
Leading the debate on the motion, Rep Adebayo said the sports ministry recently dissolved the boards of the various national sports federations and issued guidelines for elections into the federations.
He said based on the guidelines, prospective candidates who had spent two terms of four years each would not be eligible to contest elections into the sports federations.
However, he said, “each federation derives its powers from its constitution and is autonomous and any attempt to tamper with the constitutions without due process or by fiat is unlawful.”
He noted that the national federation is part of the Olympic Movement, which has its own code and governance ethics and its supreme instrument is the Olympic Charter.
Contributing to the debate, Rep Ayo Omidiran (APC, Osun), said dissolving the various federations was an act of impunity, which should not be allowed to stand.
“These federations have their heads elected to spend specific tenure in line with provisions of their constitution, and if only the constitutions are followed to the letter, then we will not have issues, but for a minister to just sit and say all the boards stand dissolved is to say the constitutions don’t matter,” she said.
On his part, Rep Edward Pwajok (PDP, Plateau), said allowing the minister’s decision to stand could earn Nigeria sanctions from the International Olympics Committee (IOC).
“This is an issue of both national and international interest. We all know too well that the International Olympics Committee has so many responsibilities on Olympics matters. We should pass this resolution to avoid sanctions from the IOC,” he said.