I drafted the NSC bill 16 years ago; today I have a mission to make sports viable in Nigeria, says NSC helmsman, Dikko

Newly appointed Chairman of the National Sports Commission NSC, Shehu Dikko says Nigeria’s journey towards a sustainable sports economy has begun.

He stated this when the former Minister of Sports, John Enoh officially handed over the affairs of the country’s sports to him in a brief ceremony in Abuja.

History is on my side

“History has a way of coming full circle because in 2008 I was a consultant to the House of Representatives and was responsible for the drafting of the National Sports Commission Bill, a job I did pro-bono and about 16 years down the line I have here with the assignment to implement the work I assisted to put together”.

” The objective of Mr President is to harness the full potential of the Sports Economy in Nigeria.

“And we have to first change our mindset from the fixation of just competitions and winning medals and come back and fix our domestic sports development”.

“When we set the foundation right the results and the winning of medals will naturally come sustainably and that should be the new mindset”.

“We cannot continue to run in cycles so we need to have a different approach from day one because in my view and indeed the firm view of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, competition is what we call  “Consumption” because we just take scarce resources and burn out abroad without any impact on the domestic sports development ecosystem and the Nigerian Economy.

” But we have to go back to “Production” which is deliberate sports development, where we set the structure right, set the framework and put together good parameters to have a sustainable sports development which will naturally give us a solid sports economy and indeed guaranteed competitive participation at all competitions and medals.

Three Pillars

” This is the reason why our administration will be focused on three pillars including running Sports as a National Asset, that is entitled to special privileges, regulations and concessions to drive growth and development to open its potential to be a key driver of the economy across all sectors, a vehicle for achieving national cohesion and projection of the positive and unique attributes of our culture and national identity “.

” We have to also work on legislations and regulations to set the framework to enable the Industry to grow effectively like what happened in the communications industry some years back”.

” The other pillar is investing in purposeful world-class infrastructures that will provide an enabling environment for Growth.

“These infrastructures must be deliberate with maintenance culture and span from world-class infrastructure for professional sports to community infrastructure to drive grassroots sports and mass participation across the country”

” The thinking of Mr President is  that after  having some of all these in place we should be able to  measure the Country’s Sports by its contribution to the nation’s GDP by at least three per cent (3%)  addition via sports and the number of jobs sports and its value chain are providing in the country in the next  four to five years and indeed our competitiveness across all competitions and tournaments”

“Thus, it’s a visionary  decision for Mr President to approve the return of the National Sports Commission to drive this  process and objectives in line with the best international practices and standards devoid of any bureaucratic bottlenecks but absolute professionalism”

Dikko concluded by outlining some of the immediate action points to drive the agenda and the mandate which includes but is not limited to the structural organization of the National Sports Commission (NSC).

The essence is to position the NSC to implement the desired policies and framework envisaged.

According to Dikko, it is to facilitate private sector participation in the sector through investment in sports production and infrastructure development.

He also outlined the restructuring and capacity-building initiatives of the sports federations for optimal performance.

Also on his agenda is the engagement of competent personnel and partners to deliver on the mandate.

This will involve policy development by putting together strategies, policies and legislations to protect and support sports development in the country.

He promised to ensure that the NSC seamlessly assume the assets and liabilities from the defunct Federal Ministry of Sports; and most critically commence the process to amend/update the NSC Act to align with international best practices, creating a professional governance framework, resolve the funding challenges of sports in Nigeria and provide the enabling environment to drive Mr President vision to create a sustainable sports economy in Nigeria.