Recipient of LEADERSHIP sports person of the year 2011 award and African number one badminton star, Ifraimu Bulus Jimkan has cautioned Nigerians, specially sportsmen and women not to get carried away by President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan’s continuous promise to overhaul the sports sector. According to him, the federal government is not to be trusted, noting that the promise will only end up as usual as an empty promise.?
President Goodluck Jonathan had immediately after Team Nigeria’s failure at the London 2012 Olympic Games ordered for a total and comprehensive re-organisation of the sports sector. He also re-echoed his promise last weekend during the presidential reception in honour of the victorious Paralympics athletes and female U-20 footballers. But Jimka, who was the only Nigerian shining light in the year 2011 that was characterized with failures, said many of such promises had been made in the past without the political will to back it up. He said because of that there was no meaningful result and Nigerians should not see Jonathan’s renewed interest in sports as a different thing from past.
“Government has kept on promising that they will do this and that, but at the end you see nothing. The Nigerian government can’t promise you that they will do anything and you take them serious.
“We have heard of several promises in the past that nothing came out of. So, for me, the president’s promise of repositioning sports is one of those empty promises government usually make. I sincerely believe that he made that promise because of the circumstance of that moment and it ends there,” he said.
He described his award as LEADERSHIP sports person of the year 2011 as a call to do more and promised to win more laurels for the country. “This is one of my happiest moments because to be considered sports person of the year among millions of Nigerians is not an easy task. I feel great and honoured because it was not an anyhow award. I thank LEADERSHIP Newspapers Group for seeing me worthy of this ward. I believe it is a call to do more and I am ready to do my country proud any time.”
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