President Muhammadu Buhari has redeemed his promise to reward the 2017 Afrobasket winning women’s team, D’Tigress of Nigeria. Each player got N1,000,000 (One million Naira) while 5 Coaching crew members got N500,000 (Five hundred thousand Naira)each.
In his address, the Minister of Youth and Sports Barrister Solomon Dalung said sports in Nigeria is moving to greater heights through the unprecedented support of the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Federal Republic of Nigeria President Muhammadu Buhari.
“In Mr President’s usual way of showing appreciation to our sports men and women who made the nation proud, he received the team at the Presidential Villa on Wednesday August 30, 2017 during the Federal Executive meeting. History is made today as His Excellency, Mr President has fulfilled his promise to the heroic Afrobasket team by doling out the sum of One million Naira (N1,000,000) to each of the players and Five hundred thousand (500,000) to each of the officials totalling Seventeen million, five hundred thousand Naira (N17,500,000).”
Barrister Dalung thanked the President for his administration’s outstanding contributions to the development of sports in Nigeria and for his extrinsic reward in particular. The Minister said that Mr President’s kind gesture will have a multiplier effect on the country’s podium success in the forth coming Commonwealth Games, scheduled to hold in Gold Coast, Australia from 4th -15th April 2018.
In his response, the Vice President of the Nigeria Basketball Federation Mr Babs Ogunade thanked the President for redeeming his promise to reward D’Tigress for their excellence and hard work. “Over a period of time, administrations have made promises to athletes and failed but with the change mantra, this administration promised to reward the gold winning basketball team and they have fulfilled their promise."
“Like Oliver Twist, we will always ask for more. As you are aware, we qualified for the World Cup in Spain next year and we are gearing up for that as well as the Commonwealth Games. We ask for the federal government’s support ahead of all these assignments although, we are also looking outward to get sponsorship so that we don’t put everything on the government. We however thank you so much and look forward to seeing that all these come to fruition,” Ogunade said.
UK Sports Minister Tracey Crouch backs Eniola Aluko, FA should accept striker's offer to help. The Football Association should accept England forward Eniola Aluko's offer to help with its reforms, says sports minister Tracey Crouch, the BBC reports.
Former England manager Mark Sampson was found to have used discriminatory language to Aluko and team-mate Drew Spence following three inquiries. The FA has since apologised. "Eni would be a great asset in helping drive cultural change," said Crouch.
The minister also said the FA must fix its culture "from the top down".
Crouch was speaking to the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport committee a month after Aluko appeared in front of the same panel to describe her experience of raising a bullying and discrimination complaint against Sampson. Aluko, who has won 102 caps, lost her place in the team after making unproven allegations of bullying in a 2016 FA cultural review.
In a BBC Sport interview last week, she said she was "open" to being part of the reform process at the FA. The FA reform must start 'right at the top' - Sports minister Crouch said that the FA's handling of the case had been "a mess" and "a sorry saga".
However, when asked whether Chairman Greg Clarke and chief executive Martin Glenn should leave the organisation, she said: "It's not for the minister of state to say whether or not a chair or chief executive of a governing body should or should not be in place... because if I can fire them, I can hire them.
"We criticise countries like China and Russia for the closeness their governments have with their sports organisations and it's not my job to say a chair or chief executive should or should not be fired."
Sampson was sacked in September following evidence of "inappropriate and unacceptable" behaviour with female players in a previous role.
