$135,000 Scandal: 8 AFN members nullifiy Gusau impeachment

May 31 06:12 2019 by The Ajasa News Print This Article

By Martin Odiete

Eight out of the thirteen board members of the The Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) has nullified the purported impeachment of the president, Ibrahim Gusau

Technical Director of  Athletics, Sunday Adeleye, while briefing newsmen in Abuja yesterday described the exercise as ‘kangaroo’ meeting, adding that the majority of the board is solidly behind the president.

“Over eight of us in the board and the entire signatories at this press briefing have passed a vote of confidence on Hon Ibrahim Gusau as the president of the AFN,” he said.

“How come only five out of 13 board members are impeaching the AFN president? I want Nigerians to also ask why the sports minister is paying 50 per cent of the money to IAAF when he had declared that he didn’t know how the money was spent? Who is fooling who?”

“Four members of out of thirteen- member board cannot remove the president, and the only person who has the authority to call for a board meeting is the president in our constitution, so where did they get their own resolution from?, what are they investigating, did anybody release any money to him? The answer is absolutely no’,” he added.

He, however, stated that the federation had not received any funding from the sports ministry to prosecute her activities since 2017.

“Since we got on board in 2017, the Ministry has not given us any dime and we have organized more than 20 competitions and attended 9 events internationally without the support of the ministry, what we got from the ministry and what it seems the minister is capitalizing on according to him is a supposed N39 million that was given to the Federation which is absolutely untrue”.

“N30 million was given to the federation and it was billed for the procurement of kits and equipment for Asaba 2018, it was about 14 days to the competition, Nigeria had no uniforms, so we came together and wrote series of letters to the ministry harping on the need for allotted funds towards providing kits for the athletes”.

“We were prudent and went as far as even providing allowances for the athletes, something that the ministry never put into consideration, we have documents on who received and withdrew all the money from the account, which led to a launch of a probe when the IAAF called for the money.”

“So they should work towards clearing their names and I hope that Nigerian athletes are happy as this has given them solace knowing they won’t be banned,” he concluded.