February 25, 2022
Save Nigeria’s Basketball, Daudu Appeals To Minister
A passionate appeal has been made to the minister of youth and sports development, Mr Sunday Dare, to come out clearly and make the rightful pronouncement that will set the Nigeria’s basketball free the current quagmire occasioned by the two parallel elections held on January 31, 2022 in Abuja and Benin City that produced Igoche Mark and Musa Kida as NBBF Presidents.
Veteran basketball coach, Adeka Daudu, made the appeal while chatting with LEADERSHIP Sports at the Indoor Sports Hall, Package B of the Moshood Abiola National Abuja, venue of the ongoing Mark D’Ball Male Championship 2022.
He said the Nigerian basketball coaches, players and other stakeholders have overwhelmingly elected Igoche Mark as the president of the Nigeria Basketball Federation based what he can do and urged the Minister and other top officials of the Ministry of Youth and Sports Development to do the right thing by follow the part of truthful and set Nigeria’s basketball free.
The former head of the Dodan Warriors Basketball Club said the coaches and home-based basketball players lost jobs and were taken away from what they love to do in the last four-to-five year of inactiveness of basketball in the domestic scene.
“All of us are saying we need Igoche Mark because of what we know he can do and we are seeing doing it. We are happy with what he is doing with Mark D’Ball and I’m sure that every other stakeholders and lovers of basketball are happy, even the pressmen should be happy that something is now happening.
“Those in the Ministry study sports, so they know the pain of athletes and coaches if they don’t have a job or which one do they prefer? Let them make this function for us, we are waiting upon them and hoping that they know the right thing to do.
“We know what is going on, if you say nobody knows it, it is not true. We know what is going on but we need to function and for us to function they need to do the right thing by taking the right decision. The Minister should come out and say things the way they are. Let us be truthful and once you are truthful, the truth shall always set you free. So, let the truth set our basketball free,” Coach Daudu urged.
He commended the organisers of the Mark D’Ball Championship, saying the players are now happy back on the basketball court doing what they love to do.
“What else can we say than to say thank you, Mark D’Ball organisers and we also say thank you, Igoche Mark, because he has actually shown that he is the new face of basketball. We have seen the reason why he was elected as the president of the Nigeria Basketball Federation (NBBF).
“We that are coaches and players just want to play and for the fact that we want to play and this is happening gives us joy. A lot of us lost our jobs for four years and the players also lost what they love to do, they lost to hang round basketball and now that we are back it is a beautiful thing. I’m happy watching games day after day and seeing everybody coming to play. To have 24 teams in three months playing a basketball tournament is wholesome.”
