Dalung Laments Inability of Cross River to Host NSF
Minister of Sports and Youth Development, Mr. Solomon Dalung, has lamented the inability of Cross River State to host the National Sports Festival since 2014 when it got the hosting right.
Dalung, who said this in Calabar on Thursday when he paid a courtesy visit to the Cross River State Command of the Nigeria Immigration Service, said the National Sports Council would meet soon to take a decision on the hosting right.
He said that it was sad that Cross River State could not host the competition which coincided with Nigeria’s centenary celebration in 2014.
Dalung noted that the festival was meant to explore new talents that would be trained to compete at the national and international levels.
“The National Sports Festival is a festival that is held yearly. The intention is to mobilise and create an enabling environment for our talents to be harvested and developed for future competitions both at the national and international levels.
“Sadly for about three years now, we have not been able to hold the National Sports Festival and Calabar has the hosting rights. It was conceded to Calabar because it coincided with the centenary celebration of the country because Calabar was the first capital city of Nigeria.
“The government was of the wisdom that it will be a great honour to the state but sadly, it was unable to live up to its responsibilities. The hosting rights still rests with Calabar until the meeting of the National Sports Council which has the authority to decide otherwise.
“We shall soon hold the meeting to decide what to do based on the inability of Cross River to host this festival. When we decide, we will let Nigerians know,” he said.
Speaking on the election of the Amaju Pinnick as a member of the Confederation of African Football executive committee, Dalung said it was a step in the right direction.
“We are happy as a nation that the CAF election has come and gone. When I came on board as minister, I made it clear that the absence of Nigeria in the executive committee of CAF, to me, was the beginning of what we can conceive as injustice.
“A country with over 170 million people cannot be copiously absent in such strategic organisation that is responsible for the passion of Africa. I am happy that a Nigerian has finally been elected, and for the presidency of CAF, another young person has also been elected.
“Like I said, as a country, what determines our participation in global politics is national interest. Wherever our national interest sways through, we will stand with it because there must be a Nigeria first before we can play football,” the minister said.