Accolades are rolling out towards top guns of the National Sports Commission (NSC) for disbursing monetary rewards to players, coaches and officials of the female basketball national team, D’Tigress, but no one is talking about the timing of those disbursements.
Four ministers were also praised for the roles they played in facilitating those disbursements, but no one is looking at the timeline, process and method of approach through which the said support came towards ensuring the team got those benefits that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu gleefully pronounced a year earlier.
Not even the most ardent of Nigerian sports critics is asking questions to know if the disbursements were made in a timely and expedient manner, or taken with a pinch of salt. Was it seen as an issue of top-notch priority, in the face of the always busy and ever-dynamic terrain of international sports?
As it were, a similar line of emoluments and rewards had also been pronounced by President Tinubu for the female football team, Super Falcons, after they won the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) for a record extending 10th time (also a year ago).
Sadly, it was until some of the players spoke out several months later that we got to learn that they had not received any of the benefits that were so emphatically and profoundly announced then loudly applauded at a grand reception for the team in Abuja.
Dramatically, it was until this week that we got to know that the Falcons have not even got any of the money that President Tinubu announced for them. That’s despite several assurances from NSC’s top echelon that the cash largesse would be handed out to the team ‘during their next camp.’
Top guns of the NSC did turn up at the Falcons’ camp during the recent WAFCON 2026 and I’m sure the players must have been elated on seeing their arrival; only to be deflated when all they got were documents and paper confirming their ownership of houses and national honours for Order Of The Niger (OON).
What about the much talked about and hugely expected cash? The answer must have shocked them – ‘Please wait a little longer. You know, the process of clearing funds through government channels is always very long.’ Tell it to the birds!
The players must have been aghast that the money family, friends, fans and well-wishers have been ‘collecting’ from them through one entreaty or the other is still not ready? That surely must have left them in low spirits!
Now I know why the Falcons lost to lowly Malawi in their first match and they could no reach the WAFCON semi-finals for the first time ever – thereby also suffering an unprecedented absence from the FIFA Women’s World Cup; even with the benefit of a second chance granted them via a first of its kind play-off versus South Africa.
Our players must have been thinking about ‘audio money’ that’s not within their grip – and they could not concentrate on the field of play. Alas! This is not only about the Falcons.
Let’s not forget that D’Tigress lost three straight games this past weekend at the ongoing FIBA Senior Women’s Basketball World Cup in Berlin, Germany. Now I know why they fell apart like a pack of cards – they too must have been thinking about ‘audio money’ that was not in their grip a year after the promise was made in physical public glare by The President himself.
Shall we tell The President? Should we let him know that his aides did not treat his declaration as a fiat that should be carried out with ‘automatic alacrity’ and utmost dispatch? Should we let him know that they treated the matter with levity and allowed a misnomer called bureaucracy stall the disbursements as when due?
Now they have applied medicine after death – disbursing money after defeat, instead of using it as a source of motivation for the players. Wouldn’t it have been wise to pay the Falcons and D’Tigress all their benefits on the eve of their first matches at their respective major championships … and see whether the players would not be ready to die on the pitch in honour of their motherland/fatherland.
Even the Bible says ‘money answers all things.’ It only becomes the root of all evil when you lust after it or you can kill to get it. In reality, money makes the world go round and life is all about ‘the Benjamins.’
Every Tom, Dick and Harry or Jane, Anne and Susan on the street knows the power of money as a motivating factor … but our egg heads in sports administration opted to disburse it as a retrogressive tool … like Jim who neglected his dad while he was alive then buried him in a golden coffin after his death.
Despite this misnomer that has led to disaster for the Super Falcons and D’Tigress, four ministers were praised ‘for facilitating the disbursements of rewards’ that were declared a year earlier. Plaudits went out for highly placed officials who never heard late Ernest Okonkwo declare emphatically,
‘Real support is when you cheer your team before they score not to celebrate after the deed is done.’ An adage also says, ‘A stitch in time saves nine.’
Why spend money on repairs when you can prevent them from happening in the first place? Yes, let’s be proactive henceforth, not reactive (nor retrogressive).
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