Following Nigeria’s decision to withdraw from International events for two years, the world Basketball Governing Body, FIBA has threatened punishment.
This was mentioned in a letter from Jaime Lamboy, FIBA’s Head of Legal, dated May 18, 2022, addressed to factional Nigeria Basketball Federation President Musa Ahmadu-Kida.
Following a lingering leadership rift in the NBBF, Sunday Dare, through the Permanent Secretary of the sports ministry, Ismaila Abubakar, announced last week that the President Muhammadu Buhari had given approval to withdraw Nigeria from all international basketball competitions for two years, with immediate effect.
The minister went on to say that the withdrawal would help the country revitalize basketball from the ground up and put an end to the basketball crisis.
FIBA, on the other hand, cautioned that Nigeria could face sanctions because of the withdrawal, citing Article 9.7 of FIBA’s General Statutes, which stipulates, “National member federations shall handle their business freely and without third-party influence.”
FIBA also reacted to a letter earlier written to them by the Ahmadu-Kida-led NBBF board.
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“In such letter, you pre-emptively informed FIBA of the apparent decision by the Nigerian Government (Federal Ministry of Youth & Sports Development) intending to have Nigeria take a break from all international engagements for two years and enabling an Interim Management Committee to run the affairs of the basketball in Nigeria,” the letter read.
“As you already are aware, Nigeria is due to participate in the following FIBA competitions in the upcoming months: FIBA 2023 Basketball World Cup Qualifiers (FBWC23 Qualifiers) FIBA 2022 Women’s Basketball World Cup (FWBWC22).
“As you are aware, any withdrawal of Nigeria from the above mentioned competitions will trigger potential disciplinary sanctions as per the FIBA Internal Regulations. Furthermore, if the absence of Nigeria from international competitions for the next two years materialises, the consequences may spread out well past such a two-year period.
“For example, please note that the withdrawal from the FBWC23 Qualifiers is also a withdrawal from the Paris 2024 Olympic qualification process. Similarly, depending on third-party results, the same situation could apply with respect to FIBA AfroBasket 2025.”
“Accordingly, we request from the NBBF to immediately inform FIBA whether its participation in the above mentioned competitions is or not ratified.
“We take the opportunity to remind the NBBF of its obligations to manage its affairs with no influence from third parties, as per Article 9.6 of FIBA General Statutes.”
10 Comments
As far as i am concerned, the minister should rescind is decision first and head to FIBA headquarters to explain the situation on ground why they opted for an interim management committe and ask FIBA to come and mediate on the matter
Buhari has destroyed everything in Nigeria , how does withdrawing from international competition help to resolve interpersonal relationships?….how can he give such directive, does he know how the girls sweated in getting the ticket to the world cup ?… please rescind this decision to allow our basketballers to compete, that evil decision will black us out in basketball for 5 years !!
Buhari has destroyed everything in Nigeria , the legacy of Buhari will be more than Nigeria can bear in terms of failure, how does withdrawing from international competition help to resolve interpersonal relationships?….how can he give such directive, does he know how the girls sweated in getting the ticket to the world cup ?… please rescind this decision to allow our basketballers to compete, that evil decision will black us out in basketball for 5 years !!
This shows the backward thinking of our leaders.How will banning our youths from competition tackle the problem of ego and self serving pursuit of the fractions.If Akida led led NBBF is recongnized by Fiba, why is the government saying otherwise?
They are politicizing it to the detriment of those who fought and risk their lives in this covid 19 era to play in the qualifiers.
They want to block all the things that give our youths some hope for the future and they will not succeed.
Let them rescind the decision immediately before it is too late.
Wisdom is the principal thing. This is purely wisdom crisis. Taking a break for two years from international competition is uncalled for.
Like I said previously, Sunday Dare is the maniac behind every backwardness in our sports today. It’s either his way or the highway.
Im still struggling to remember when and where cutting off the head is ever a cure for headache.
Do you have to withdraw from international competitions because you want to solve some baseless ego problems…?
Is it outrightly impossible to solve these problems without jeopardizing the future of basketball and the careers of the youths involved. Must your boys be in charge of the NBBF by force….???
There is a board recognized by FIBA in place and that’s all that is supposed to matter. But because Dare’s cronies whom he wants to foist in the NBBF are not recognized by FIBA, our basketball has to suffer for it.
FIBA recognizes the Kida led board….finis and klaar. FIBA sent their representatives to monitor their elections, ratified it and approved their emergence. FIBA did not send representatives to monitor any factional election, FIBA did not ratify their election, FIBA did not approve their emergence. FIBA DOES NOT RECOGNIZE SUNDAY DARE AND HIS FACTIONAL CRONIES.
This clueless minister should hands off the NBBF NOW. Dare should withdraw his piggy nose from NBBF affairs permanently.
He only has less than 1 year left in office as minister, but he wants to withdraw Nigeria from basketball for 2 years, because his boys are not recognized by FIBA, so that we can suffer the consequences till 2027 and beyond
Pray tell me…How this decision going to help our basketball…..HOW?
We will loose out on qualifications we struggled to achieve, at a time when our global basketball rankings are at its highest we are pulling out and would be set 20 years aback, and the funny thing is that after the 2 years, we wouldn’t still have found solutions to the maladministration bedeviling the sports ministry and it’s federations.
Part of the reason why we are still stuck on 3 AFCON wins till date is because we pulled out of 1996 AFCON at a time our golden generation were in their peak and got banned by CAF till 2000. We cant allow a clueless minister to once again shoot us in the foot again this time around.
Sunday Dare is a curse to Nigerian sports. I repeat, Sunday Dare is a curse to Nigerian sports. Anything he touches ends in tears.
Sunday Dare is making Solomon Dalung look like the best thing that ever happened to Nigerian sports.
The only problem there is to solve is Sunday Dare dissolving his faction with immediate effect and allow a duly and legally elected board carry out its duties….and it does not require withdrawing from international competitions.
That confusionist should just finish his remaining 1 year in peace and let our sports also experience some peace. Under him almost all sports federations are in one form of turmoil or the other. He is also the one who engineered the disaster we are experiencing in our football at the moment….Haba….kilode….even lucifer is not this wicked na…!!!
#SAVE OUR BASKETBALL NOW
Nigerians are very wicked… That’s why nothing works in that country. The Sunday Date guy is even a youngman o… See how he is acting and confusing Oldman Buhari like Dracula looking for blood… The ban remains an idiotic decision it is politics being played… Buhari is leaving office so looters wants to use their current closeness to power to install stooges and control them later…
Minister Dare you have the power to fix this madness instead of banning Basketball in the Country. I love watching Dtigers and Tigress, banning them will kill the sports for the next 5-7years.
Nigerians we love power, fame,money and authority any how it comes. Before now we have never had power tussle in leadership position of our basketball, because activities were on they low side and money wasn’t flowing in. Everybody put eyes on football.
But now that we have been having influx of foreign born willing and whole heartedly representing theirs Father’s land and Nigeria seem to be on the steady rise on global stage of basketball.
More competitions, more wins, more money and more traviling then power and leadership tussle suddenly appeared. What has never happened in the history of basketball in Nigeria before.
Nigerian like quick way of getting those things I made mention earlier. That is the reason why power tussle can be seen.
Those involved in power tussle should know that there is more to be a leader than the personal benefits that always push them to fight tooth and nail for leadership position.
These are some of the responsibilities one would expect from anybody anticipating to be a leader in of our sports event.
1. Good sponsorship
2.Organisation of a contnuous compittition at the grass root
3. Good welfare and severance package for athletics or players as the case may be.
4.Ensuring strong representation at the international level anytime the occasion arise.
These and many more will display or portrait you as a leader with vission and goals.
But what do we have it is either one useless Alahji from the North that managed to escape almaji camp who has never been really exposed to ideal way of life or another greedy incompetent fellow from the south that has nothing or no knowledge about sports fighting tooth and nail for a post they can handle very well.
The collective happiness of their fellow nigerians is nothing to them.
Development of athletics or player whom their career in life is totally depends on sports events mean nothing to them.
Negative decision of governmning body on the image of the country means nothing to them so long there is opportunity for them to loot, travels at expense of Nigerian fund. Using the opportunity to procure visa into various countries and having access to or to be an official of world governing body as some of them have used Nigerian to landed themselves one appointment or the other with Fifa.
During this DARE Devil man…
*15 Athletes were banned from participating in Olympic and our representatives even had problems with this people all through the competition. Hence happened to be our worst Olympic ever.
* Our coach was rubbished, sacked after meeting up all targets without pay and then we were later disgraced out of the Nation’s cup and didn’t qualify for world cup.
* Now, Our Basketball that’s currently the best in Africa is handing off the game for the next two years. Good.
At least, we won’t forget this Mr Sunday (Dare Devil) Dare. Cos he’s been able to create names for himself either good or bad.