The Director General (DG) of the National Institute for Sports(NIS), Comrade Philip Shaibu, has vowed to address some anomalies surrounding the operation of the organisation so that it can match up with the Renewed Hope Agenda of President Bola Tinubu.
Receiving the executive members of the Edo State Chapter of the Sports Writers Association of Nigeria(SWAN) led by its Chairman, Comrade Kehinde Osagiede, when they paid him a visit in his home in Benin City, he recalled that the sight that greeted him when he paid a maiden visit to the Abuja and Lagos Centres of the institute was an eyesore as the facilities therein have depleted and deteriorated over the years because of lack of maintenance.
He averred that it is not in contention that Nigeria has a horde of sporting facilities and infrastructure capable of catering for the whole of Africa if put to proper use. He disclosed that because many of the infrastructure have remained unused for a long period of time, they have become non-functional and obsolete.
Shaibu, who also mentioned that a lot of courses and programmes that ought to be run by the NIS have been abandoned and unutilised, promised to reform the NIS by bringing some new and relevant courses for coaches and athletes and expunge old and irrelevant ones.
“In the coming weeks, we are going to be restructuring the NIS in line with its mandate. There would be a lot of reforms that we are going to carry out in the coming weeks. We will make sure that we add to the courses in the NIS, and expunge some. We are going to upgrade the courses beyond where they are now,” he asserted.
According to him: “Those infrastructure were built not just to produce athletes for Nigeria alone, but for Africa and the world at large. I saw some equipment – brand new – but they are non-functional because they were not put into use. In fact, I saw some brand new equipment in their carton but they are not working.”
Comrade Shaibu promised to decentralise the NIS for easy access by the grassroots adding that “as a training institute, coaches would be trained at local government level so as to eliminate a situation anyone comes on board to bear the name coach without having basic certification to back up the claim.
“We’re going to be decentralising the NIS for easy access and easy reach. The mandate of the NIS when it was created 50 years ago was to have centres across the six geo-political zones in Nigeria. But we intend to go beyond the six geo-political zones because we need to go to the grassroots to deal with the issue of coaches.
“That means we are going to be having local government training centres where we will be training those coaches with the basic knowledge they need to impact on the athletes.”
He promised to reactivate the athletes’ hostels in the institute by making sure they are given a facelift and ensure only athletes are permitted to stay in the hostels. He disclosed that illegal occupants of the hostels would be ejected as they are meant for the comfort of athletes.
Earlier, the Edo SWAN Chairman, Comrade Kehinde Osaigede, while recalling the attention to details that characterised Comrade Shaibu’s days as Deputy Governor of Edo State whereby he was in charge of Sports said: “We are here to congratulate you on your national assignment. We have no doubt that you will perform well considering what you did when as the Deputy Governor of Edo State you were in charge of Sports.
“We thank President Bola Tinubu for considering you worthy of the appointment. Being our patron we see your appointment as our own appointment. We’re with you and will continue to be with you all the way.
“Your records in Edo State are indelible. The discipline you instilled. The attention to details etc still stand. The infrastructure you help to put in place and other things are still intact. We hope they will give you the resources and a free hand to operate.”
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