By Lateef Adekola
Friends Of Nigeria Sports have made a quick response to an online press statement credited to your a group under the umbrella, ‘New Face Of Basketball’.
In the said statement headlined, ‘The End To This Has Not Come’, the group led by Pastor Scambo Morrison, disclosed its plans to disrupt the peaceful and smooth workings presently going on in the Nigeria Basketball Federation. The group also threatened to stage a protest, while foolishly accusing the the Honourable Minister of Youth and Sports Development, Chief Sunday Dare, of imposing Engr. Ahmadu Musa Kida on the NBBF.
It stated that Sunday Dare did a ‘subtle imposition’ of Engr.Musa Kida as the President of the Nigeria Basketball Federation(NBBF), describing it as illogical, irrational,unreasonable and miscarriage of justice. How that is so, people continue to wonder!
Friends Of Nigeria Sports(FNS), in its reactionary statement, signed by its National Coordinator, Chief Dipreiye Thompson, described the accusations levelled against the Sports Minister, as uncharitable, unreasonable, foolish and unpatriotic.
“This baseless and unfounded accusations goes to show that they do not even understand the statutes of sports federations as well as the Ministry’s code of Governance guiding the operations of all the Sports Federations.
“These group of dissidents are being led blindly by Scambo Morrision and his likes, who don’t care to even understand the rules and regulations governing elections as well as the statutes under which the NBBF operates.
The statement read, “They knew that there was only one NBBF President and that’s Engr. Ahmadu Musa Kida, who was duly elected at the approved and recognised NBBF Elective Congress, which held early this year, in Benin City. And it was conducted according to the NBBF statutes, in strict compliance to the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports Code of Governance and duly observed by FIBA. So which other elections are they referring too?”
“It is obvious that these group of people want to rock the boat of NBBF and continue to take it backwards, even when they know that they are merely playing funny games of no substance.
“Do you just wake, call your friends, go into a stadium or parade ground, claim to hold an elections and declare yourselves winners for the fun of creating trouble? What manner of stakeholders are these? These are sworn enemies of basketball. There are legitimate processes to every elections, not only on basketball, the national coordinator of FNS,” noted.
“Unfortunately, These people have refused to accept the olive branch of peaceful resolution and reconciliation offered by the Musa Kida led NBBF board, to bring the Basketball family together, even when their grievances are dismissible.
“It is a pity that these misled people are myopic, uninformed and have decided to wallow in total hatred and penchant for disunity. My advise, is that they should stop living in their fools paradise and join the NBBF train of progress,” he added.
“Nigeria and Nigeria Basketball will be better. If they want to contest elections next time, they should read through the statutes of the Federation and the guidelines, so that they don’t assume the powers that they do not have, he remarked.
“It is a shame that these dissidents have refused to accept the stark realities that Nigeria basketball, under the leadership of Kida, is unperturbed and unfazed by such mindless shenanigans, as it remains focused and determined on its mandate to take the game of basketball in Nigeria, to greater heights,” Thompson stated.
“On behalf of Friends of Nigeria Sports, I tell you boldly, that whatever the evil plans of these people against the betterment of basketball in Nigeria is, it will never prosper. They will continue to walk in shame, as their desperation knows no bounds,” he concluded.
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