Caretaker Committees: Ekiti State Coach Wants Yusuf Removed From Judo Federation Now

IKPO IGBINOBA

 Ekiti State judo coach, Morakinyo Akinwale wants the Sports Minister to sack  Mr. Bolaji Yusuf from the caretaker committee of the Nigeria Judo Federation,  NJF now.

Last week Sports Minister, Mr. Sunday Dare inaugurated caretaker committees to oversee the administration of  federations before elections later in the year.

Each federation had a three-member committee including the incumbent secretary. 
A member of the dissolved judo federation, Brig General Zakari Abubakar was appointed as chairman of the committee with Bolaji Yusuf also a member of the sacked board as member while Mrs. Monica Otomola serves as secretary.

Coach Akinwale said the re-emergence of Mr. Yusuf in judo was a disaster for the martial art. “Appointing Bolaji Yusuf as a member of the caretaker committee is one huge mistake that should be urgently addressed”, he told P.M. EXPRESS in a chat.

While he hailed the sports ministry for dissolving the federations the coach was quick to add “With the appointment of Mr Yusuf as a member of the NJF caretaker committee, the purpose of setting up the committee to reposition the sport would be defeated”.

The Ekiti state coach claimed that Mr. Yusuf failed woefully as representative of the south west zone on the just dissolved  board.

According to him “Four years ago, through a highly controversial election,  Bolaji Yusuf came on board as the south west representative. “Without trying to malign him, he ruined  judo in the zone during his tenure.

Coach Akinwale stressed “Prior to the federation elections in 2017, Mr. Yusuf promised to provide states in the zone with equipment, regular competitions and seminars. 

“He also promised to bring in sponsors to the zone to take judo to the next level”.The coach said Yusuf failed woefully to fulfil any of his promises. 

“In four years, he couldn’t even organise a  day’s seminar not to talk of having just a competition. Even Mr. Yusuf would admit that he failed woefully.”

The coach appealed to the ministry to remove Mr. Yusuf immediately because he wont add value to the work of the committee.

On the composition of the committee, the coach wondered why no judoka was appointed to be a member.”It is rather strange that no judoka was appointed to be part of the judo committee whereas the taekwondo and karate federations(part of the martial arts family) had practitioners on their committees”

He noted that there were two judokas on the dissolved board Messrs Dickson Egbowon and Amos Ilya.”Why didn’t the ministry pick one of them instead of a Yusuf?”, Akinwale asked.

He said Nigeria has repeatedly violated the statues of the International Judo Federation, IJF and the Africa Judo Union, AJU in appointing or electing non judokas to lead the judo federation.

“This flagrant violation of international rules has reduced Nigeria to minnows in global judo politics and stifled the growth of the sport”.