Otunba Tajudeen Akinyemi is the Chairman, Ondo State Football Agency (ODSFA). He spoke with Line Editors on the preparations and readiness of Sunshine Stars Football Club of Akure for the NPFL 2018/2019 season 

Excerpts:

What is the aspiration of the present administration towards sports?

The aspiration is to encourage youths towards sports and  to visit  all the local governments to see that youths participate in sports and more importantly to help the administration so as to make the youth useful for themselves and their own state.

Of what benefit is sporting activities?

First of all, it is about making individuals to have good health. A healthy youth or a healthy person will always deliver. I will give you an example, if you do very well in any sport of your choice, you can be managed to travel overseas and have a better club and from there, you can raise a lot of funds back to the government.

Two of my boys will be going to Norway where I came from so as to go for trials. And from there, maybe 200-300 Euros will come back to us and we will give that back to the government. Not only that, I will extend it to even the wrestlers who wrestled for Ondo State. Seven of them got gold medals during the last  National Sports Festival. With that, it is no more amateur, it is about professionalism. And with that, they will bring money back to the state and they will gain from it.

The gain is not only money, when your youths are healthier, it will help the whole state in many ways, but when they are not in good form, it will not help us in making our state better.

Ondo State slid from 6th to 10th position in the recent National Sports Festival held in Abuja, what accounted for this?

Honestly, I didn’t go to the sports festival because Ondo State was not represented in football, they were eliminated before the festival. Nevertheless, I can say a little bit about that. You know sports festival, we  have it every two years and you can see there is a gap, there is a space, a vacuum. So every state, most especially Ondo State, did not prepare for it. Ondo State was supposed to host the festival but because of lack of fund and lack of preparedness and the rest. But I think 10th position is not so bad.

Sports is about winning and losing, you can’t win every time.  You lose some and you gain some. If you don’t do that, the sportsmanship will not be there. So you must win some and gain some. And again you see, where we used to have medals before, it was in swimming but this time around, the cadre that gave us many gold medals was wrestling as compared to swimming. We used to have many medals in swimming. I think we have only one gold medal in swimming and we have seven gold medals in wrestling and that is fantastic.

Sunshine Stars dropped from 6th to 18th position during the last NPEC, what was the cause?

I came in last year like I told you. When I came, I met many things on ground. I couldn’t change anything. When we started the league, we were number five, suddenly we played Kano Pillars at home here in Akure and somebody threw something at the Referee and that was it: they deducted three points from us and from there, we went down to 19th position because it was close. It was only one point or goal aggregate that divided every club. That was it, we were struggling to make things happen and so we came to number 18. The league concluded at week 24 and we were called upon. There were a lot of problems with the NFF, between Pinnick and Giwa and that took us much time, we couldn’t play, we couldn’t do anything. Although,  I was with them at Russia, We went to Russia together for the Eagles. When we came, we went to LMC meeting. So myself, Lobi Stars GM and Akwa United GM told them we couldn’t continue like this because we want to conclude the league and let Lobi represent us. It was taken like that because if we want to continue, we will not meet CAF date because we have wasted much time on nothing. That was it and we concluded on that level.

Then the NNL, we said they should promote four so as to make 24 instead of 20 and we will play abridged league. We will be divided into 2 – 12 here, 12 there and three to be relegated here and three there.

That was what we said at the LMC but to my surprise, the NNL refused to play the game but day before yesterday, they have started playing it. And four clubs will emerge from there. And again with Sunshine Stars, we started pre-season, remember the gold tournament pre-season was supposed to hold in Ado Ekiti but they brought it to Akure because of hoodlums. They brought it to Akure because of APC/PDP thing happening in Ado Ekiti. We played the pre-season, we won it.

We were invited to Wike Garden City tournament. We were there pre-season again and we won it. We have won two trophies this season now and the season will commence this Sunday and our first point of call is Kwara United in Ilorin and we’re going there 100%. As I am speaking to you, Sunshine Stars is on their way to Ibadan for another camping, then moving to Ilorin on Saturday to play Kwara United on Sunday.

What plans are on ground to ensure that Sunshine is not relegated in the forthcoming league season?

Relegation has to do with how you prepare the team. If you see what we have produced this pre-season, you will see we are ready to say yes to anytime they want to start the league. With this, I think we can go to places this year. I hope and I am still hoping that Sunshine Stars will represent Nigeria continentally.

For Rising Stars, the feeder team for Sunshine Stars, long time ago, I discovered Abbey Sunday, Alaba, Dayo, Oboabona, I discovered them. I came from Norway to put them in the Rising Stars and from there they got promotion to Sunshine Stars. After that, there is nobody again. But this time around, I have promoted five boys now to Sunshine Stars. It is just the beginning. We are going back to our normal way of doing things. When you have Rising Stars, you must get the boys promoted. And that’s what we are doing and from this, I think we are going places this year. We need your prayers anyway and we do our own part too.

Some people are of the opinion that investment in sports  are  a waste   what is your take on this?

It is not a waste. I came from Norway. I have been in Norway for over 30 years. My children grew up in Norway. When you participate in sports, the health benefits are numerous.  When you are fit, it is even enough for you. You make a lot of production. That singular point is enough for us to participate in sports.

But then, the world is a global village today. If you are a footballer for example, …it is only in Nigeria that athletes don’t have lot of money but overseas, athletes are rich. In Nigeria, I don’t know how they do it here. There, if you play handball or you are a swimmer, you will get much money. Maybe it is because of sponsors. I have three boys and they play football. One of them is just leaving for Norway. He is now an agent. He sustained injury and converted himself to an agent. And he is making money. It is only in Nigeria that you don’t make money. Our professional footballers, how much do they pay them? It is not enough at all. But there, when you get 100 thousand dollars per week, don’t you think it is very encouraging to do sports? We are in a country where a lot of things are not happening. You and I must do it together so as to carry our country to a better level.

Sports give a lot of things. Most of these guys, through sports,  are educated. They have much money, they have peace with the people. It is through sports. You don’t see sports people fighting each other like the politicians. You see harmony, you see peace, you see love. That is what sports is all about.

Can this aspect be used to take care of joblessness and insecurity?

That is what we are saying. If I don’t have job now and I am a good footballer, you can encourage me to play football.  But when you encourage me, don’t give me peanut; give me money to sustain my family. When you do that to every interested person, then you are settling the unemployment thing. NFF, which is the head of the whole football in Nigeria must do things the right way. You cannot be using footballers just like that.  Like when you are injured or old and they dumped you. No insurance, no money to take care of you.  You see some of them walking around,  no welfare package.

Since I came back from Norway, I have written a lot of letters to LMC that this must stop. We must see to the welfare of the players because it is going to be very shameful for me as the president of Sunshine Stars, somebody has just finished with me, he cannot even have a place to stay. How will I equate that? I have written to them, we must have insurance scheme for them. We must see that when they finished playing football, they must have something to take home.

Outside the government,  we can hardly see individuals, corporate bodies sponsoring sports, why?

That is what I just said now. Our sponsorship is not so good here. Though NFF has got a lot of them like GLO, Dangote but  the are  not enough. When we came in,  GLO said it  will give us N700million. I was happy but till now, I am still waiting for them and they have written a letter that they wanted to give us N700m every season.  Nothing has come  till today. We are just arranging for another sponsorship now. It is not easy in Nigeria but then, we must play football.

What was the situation at the agency when you took over?

I won’t be so specific about that but when I came in, I met  some  debts owed by different administrations and we need to pay some hooligans  every month. And these hooligans were organised by the previous administration and we must pay them because they  were on contract  so they must be paid.

With those things, it is not good for sports. I don’t know where they came from. They don’t touch ball. But they will just be there and shouting about their salary. It is very painful when you inherit something like that. I am still paying now but it is  better now than when I just resumed. You know when you have done nothing and you keep saying I have to pay. These are the things that are worrying Sunshine Stars

What is your agency doing to curb act of thuggery and hooligalism in stadium?

Last year, I remembered vividly that we had a seminar before the league commenced. What we told them was that thuggery is not good for our society and that football is love, peace and  harmony. These are things that galvanise football.  And if we continue throwing bottles and doing things otherwise, it will not be very good for us and that is what I told them during the seminar. Some people spoke too. FA chairman, Otunba Dele Ajayi was there with me. But after some weeks, they threw a bottle at the Referee. It was very unpalatable.

Were there no security apparatus to checkmate this  at the stadium ?

Yes we have. We have the police and the Civil Defence Corps members .

How did they bring in bottles if there was really security at the entry?

There are lots of entries. Even you can smuggle anything in anytime anywhere. It is just going to be our mind-set. I am a civilised person, why should I carry bottle to stadium. It is always about that.

In the past,  people paid to watch their darling team,  Sunshine Stars but during the last season,  the gate was thrown open free,  what was responsible for this?

We needed our supporters. When the three points were deducted, we needed supporters to cheer us up so  that we could be able to come up. That was my own initiative. I told them we didn’t need money now. What we needed  was solid support so  that we can bring Sunshine from relegation. That was what brought about  that. But this year, we have started very well. We will get our tickets sold and I know things will start as usual.

What target did your management team set for the new technical  management of Sunshine Stars?

Yes, we have told them:  Kabiru Dogo was in Nasarawa. He is a very good guy, very nice, fantastically professional person. He is with Sunshine now. He has won two trophies now. We have told him we want to represent Nigeria continentally and our governor has said this to us that under his administration, he wants us to represent Nigeria. That’s where we are really moving towards.

Were you aware of the athletes protest at the stadium last  Monday?

 Yes, I was aware. It was yesterday. Sunshine Stars supposed to train that yesterday. On getting there, the handicaps were the ones who barricaded the gate. Some of them claimed they have not been paid for 16 months, some said  eight, some said  seven  months.

For me, I do not know much about it. I belong to another unit. I will not be able to say anything about it because it is not my area. But I saw them and I sympathised with them, especially the para athletes. It was not so nice to see. I didn’t really like it. My children play football and no day they complained they have not been paid.  But here, they do things the way they like

Is there a way you can intervene?

Who am I to intervene? I am just somebody who is asked to do a  job which I think I should do properly. I should be focused to do the job. But honestly if I can help them , I would be able to help them. I can only give advice especially to the honourable Commissioner for Sports, he is a good chap and he has been helping us.

Are you comfortable with the level of funding?

What I was told when I started this job was that during the last administration of Mimiko, they used to give them N120 m but it later reduced toN 80. But when I came in, I started with N30. You can see the big vacuum. I struggled all along but after speaking with our amiable governor, he was able to add N15m, making N45m now and we are still working towards N70m so that we can pay salaries and wages, pay people who have been owed, fund  some projections, like you are travelling to play Elkanemi in Maiduguri, it is going to be very nice if we can fly there.

But then, we are on N45m now and we are managing. If our governor can still think otherwise and put more, I will be so happy.

Your  advice to Sunshine players

You see, when you are a professional person, the bedrock of every profession is discipline. A disciplined  player is always going to do things rightly.  What do I mean by this? Alcoholism, women or whatever, face your profession, have open mind, be sociable to others and of course, have peace with yourself and have peace with others. With all these qualities, you will be able to play football very well. But if your mind is not so organised, not disciplined, it is going to be very problematic for you to play.

My advice to them is that they should not do things to other players what they cannot do for themselves. If they do it to other players, it may affect them in the future. They should be disciplined, open minded, focused, try to be disciplined, honest with  peace of minds, love, these will take  them  anywhere in the world.