Nigerian Coach: ‘We have paid for injustice done to Seye Ogunlewe, incompetence and nepotism’

A member of Team Nigeria’s track and field coaching crew to the Paris 2024 Olympics has told SportsNow.com.ng that Nigeria may have paid for the injustice done to sprinter, Seye Ogunlewe by the Athletics Federation of Nigeria, AFN.

Ogunlewe, the fourth fastest Nigerian sprinter this year and one of the two inform sprinters with just a few days to the Paris 2024 Olympics was not listed in the AFN 35-man team to the Games after he fulfilled all criteria listed by the federation as well as World Athletics’ entry standards.

Instead, the AFN picked two athletes who failed to compete at the trials to ascertain their fitness for the Games. One of the two athletes, Godson Oghenebrume, got injured in the team’s training camp in Germany and was reportedly ruled out for eight weeks.

The AFN, in connivance with the Federal Ministry of Sports Development, did not issue any official statement regarding the status of the athlete because it must have been decided the Lagos-born Ogunlewe must not be in the team at all costs, especially when it was still possible to effect a change.

The federation was however forced to admit, albeit indirectly, that Oghenebrume was not fit after he was withdrawn from the 100m event. Then, it was time for the relays, the athlete was also nowhere to be found even though he was fully accredited, collected all the allowances collected by the athletes, including the competition grant the Sports Ministry termed training grant.

With Nigeria out of the medal zone in track and field for the third time in the last four Olympics, a member of the coaching crew (names withheld) has revealed the entire team may have been cursed because of the injustice done to Ogunlewe.

‘It is as if we have been cursed because of what has happened to us here. Seye should have been here but, for whatever reasons, including nepotism, he was not here and the boy who we brought here injured was a distraction to the rest of the team,’ said the coach who begged not to be named for fear of victimization.

‘My brother, everything here was designed to make sure we failed. The foreign coaches, especially those from the colleges where Nigerian athletes are schooling were made to be in charge of our relays to the extent that the athletes were not taking any instructions from us,’ added the coach.

The coach did not also spare the technical director who was accredited as a coach but watched helplessly as indiscipline reigned supreme in the team.

‘We have been made to pay for the incompetence of a few and nepotism. I pray we don’t pray we have this kind of AFN again,’ he concluded.

Sportsnow.com.ng recalls that three of the four times Nigeria has returned without a medal since 2012 Olympics, the AFN has been headed by a politician from Delta state.

Solomon Ogba was in charge in 2012 and 2016 and Tonobok Okowa is in charge at the Paris 2024 Olympics.

In 2021 when Ese Brume won a medal, preparations were done and concluded before Okowa assumed leadership of the federation.