Why Past Nigerian Judo Boards Failed To Live Up To Expectations – Ex Technical Chief

IKPO IGBINOBA

IKPO IGBINOBA

Former technical helmsman of the Nigeria Judo Federation, NJF Dickson Egbowon has declared that the recently dissolved board failed because a non judoka was the head.

Though Egbowon served on the Timothy Nsirim-led board, the former national coach gave a damning assessment of the dissolved board.

He told PM Express in an exclusive interview that the last board of the NJF failed woefully.

Egbowon did not mince words “Going by the records, the last four years were woeful for judo in the country.

We had never had it so bad”.

When taken to task that he was part of the dissolved board, Egbowon one of the very few top flight judo coaches in the country revealed how he was frustrated as member of the team.

He alleged that he was not allowed to function as the technical head, a position he was elected to by majority of Nigerian coaches.

Mr. Egbowon lamented “In the four years of that board, I was not allowed to function for one day. I was frustrated.”
” In fact my role was hijacked from me and handed over to someone else. I was relegated to the background”.

The ex-technical supremo who was Nigeria’s coach to the 2004 Athens Olympics said the problem with Nigerian judo has remained the imposition of non-judokas as presidents of the board. 

That according to him has been the bane of the sport in the country.

Mr. Egbowon wondered “I find it difficult to explain why non judokas will come from the blue and emerge the president of the NJF in flagrant violation of the International Judo Federation, IJF statutes”.

He noted that Nigeria was the only country in the world having non judokas heading her judo federation.

“I have attended the Olympics, the World Championship and the All Africa Games as a national coach and I have never seen a country with a non judoka as president of the judo federation. 

“Only Nigeria is committing that fraud and the country’s judo is paying dearly for it”.

He said if Nsirim had been a judoka, he would have appreciated his technical depth in the sport and allowed him to do his job.

According to him “Since Nsirim was not a judoka, he didn’t know my pedigree so he organized my ouster as technical head of the federation”

Egbowon appealed to the Sports Minister, Mr. Sunday Dare to ensure that the forthcoming election must be conducted in line with the statutes of the International Judo Federation and Africa Judo Union.

“That is the only way our judo would take its rightful place in the comity of nations”