Nigeria’s athletes to the 2016 Paralympic Games have lamented the state of their preparations, saying their trainings ahead of the global Games have gone from bad to worse, with their 23-day camping allowances yet to be paid by the sports ministry.
Nigerians are counting on the Paralympic team to help the country salvage some pride after the dismal outing of the Olympic team – which won just one bronze medal courtesy of the men’s football team – which was majorly due to chaotic preparations ahead of the sports fiesta.
But it seems the sports authorities have failed to learn from the lessons of the Olympics, as the special sports athletes claim they train under worse conditions at their Abuja camp ahead of the Paralympics, which begin on September 7.
One of the athletes, who pleaded anonymity, told our correspondent that they were to be paid N2000 daily as camping allowance while officials were to collect N2500. But the athlete, who specialises in field events, disclosed that they were owed 23 days, which summed up to N46000.
“This is the worst camp I have ever attended. What we get is bad food and bad facilities. We’ve been training under the worst conditions you can think of, yet we are still being owed camp allowances for 23 days. Is that fair on us? If they pay us this money, we can at least buy good food to eat, since what they have for us is beans, bread and rice,” our source said.
Another athlete said they were in the dark over when they would make the long trip to Brazil.
“Everywhere in camp is dull. Right now, we don’t even know when we are travelling to Brazil. The rumour going round is that we will be travelling on Wednesday, but there is no official statement to that, so we don’t know when we will leave. We pray our case will not be like that of the football team, who were stranded in the US before they were rescued,” the powerlifter stated.
Credit: Punch
