There are uneasy calm among the officials under the umbrella of National Technical Officials, NAATO, who officiated at the Nigeria Track and Field Championship in Benin which served as trials for the World Athletics Championships held in Budapest, Hungary in August following the failure of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) to pay them their allowances.
A member of NATO who preferred to be anonymous says all appeals including a Save Our Soul, SOS, letter to Tonobok Okowa, the embattled President of the federation have fell on deaf ears.
A copy of the SOS was given to our correspondent and in it, Professor Lucas Ogunjimi, the association’s President wrote thus:
‘Kindly allow me to bring to your notice the most unfortunate treatment that members of our association (NATO) received from the Federation (AFN) over our participation (officiating) at the World Championships Trials in Benin City.
‘Many of our members were compelled to borrow money in order to settle their hotel bills and or pay their transport back home because of lack of payment of officiating allowance,’ wrote NAATO President, Prof Lucas Ogunjimi in the SOS sent to Okowa.’
The official told our correspondent they are planning to take the matter up with the Sports Minister.
‘The AFN has been treating us as if we don’t exist but have forgotten we give legitimacy to whatever event they hold because we have been certified to do the job in accordance with World Athletics rules,’ said the official who blasted the present AFN leadership as being self serving and inhuman.
‘What they are owing us is less than N5m (five million naira) but they found it convenient to pay the AFN President N40m as refund for monies he spent to organise some competitions for the federation.
‘If what is in the media space is correct, the refund should not have been made from the money the Federation received as sponsorship fee from Premium Trust Bank. It was reported in the media the contract with the bank was signed on June 28, 2023 while the competitions the President received the refund for were held before the signing of the agreement.’
The official says they will also, likely, take up the matter with the House of Representatives and Senate sports committees if the Sports Minister continues to pretend as if he does not know what is happening in the AFN regarding their case.
‘The Sports Minister cannot pretend he has not read about our much publicized SOS to the AFN President. This is the height of insensitivity by the leadership of the AFN,’ added the officials
