Friday, March 29, 2024

Reviving the dying stadiums

Most Nigerians were shocked by a recent media report that the National Stadium in Abuja had been violated. The edifice, a costly dome erected to celebrate sport and encourage Nigerian athletes, according to the report, is now no more than a shadow of its old self.

Suffering total neglect, the stadium is said to be home to thieves and burglars, while its bushy lawn has also become a grazing land for cattle herdsmen.

The report added that the stadium, due to the neglect, harbours dangerous reptiles as well.

The decadence that is the Abuja stadium had long been foreshadowed by the shame of a nation, exemplified in the poor state of the Lagos National Stadium in Surulere. There, oddities walk on all fours. Apart from an array of damaged sport facilities that disfigure the stadium, at night, it is a marketplace for revellers, prostitutes and suspected criminals.

Poor maintenance has become a major problem in Nigeria, ravaging all spheres of life, no doubt. The sport arena, on which the attention of most Nigerians is fixated, is no exception to this retrogression.

Most of the national stadia that hosted the 2009 FIFA Under-17 World Cup in Nigeria, are suffering the same neglect, arising from mismanagement and other forms of vices. The facilities, which the world rated as some of the best when they came for the cadets’ championship, have also lost their allure, owing to the touted culture of neglect. It is surprising that, though a huge chunk of tax payers’ money was sunk into reviving and re-modelling the stadia to get FIFA approval for the 2009 tournament, the entire facilities are now either in a sorry state or have been looted.

For instance, the National Stadium, Abuja, and the Lagos stadium (the oldest in Nigeria) are into this sorry pass despite being potential revenue-generating ventures for the Federal Government, their owners.

In 2009, only Teslim Balogun Stadium, owned by the Lagos State Government, got FIFA’s approval to stage the event in Lagos, while the organisers abandoned the National Stadium due to the little time given by FIFA to put the facilities in good shape. Apart from Teslim Stadium, Nigerians then had the unique opportunity of watching matches in other cities like Bauchi, Calabar, Enugu, Ijebu-Ode, Abuja and Kano.

However, the Lagos State Government gave sport lovers in Lagos a glimmer of hope recently when it initiated moves to take over the Surulere National Stadium from a lacklustre Federal Government.

A recent visit to the stadium by the Lagos team was a jaw-dropping spectre, as the visitors simply dismissed the stadium as the worst environment to play football or transact any legitimate business.

The main turf of the stadium is a sorry sight, just as bad as its tartan tracks. All the plastic seats in the pavilion are almost gone. The swimming pool, too, is in a bad shape. The toilets are unkempt and emit foul odour from time to time. Only the Sports Federation building, the Nigeria Olympic Committee secretariat and the Lagos State Sports Writers Association building are still intact.

In some countries, stadia are centres for tourists and international businesses. A well-managed stadium can generate enough resources for its maintenance.

Good facilities also encourage sportsmen and women to showcase their potential in a conducive environment.

Traditionally, most of the local clubs in Nigeria are supposed to build their respective, permanent stadia that will conform to international standards, to play their home games. But they need government motivation and encouragement, which under the circumstance, are far-fetched.

In the same vein, majority of clubs in the Nigerian league are funded by state governments that are owing players and their officials catalogues of debts, from sign-on fees and bonuses, to sundry allowances.

How would such clubs build a stadium that would be properly managed, and generate adequate revenue for maintenance?

The swimming pool, too, is in a bad shape. The toilets are unkempt and emit foul odour from time to time. Only the Sports Federation building, the Nigeria Olympic Committee secretariat and the Lagos State Sports Writers Association building are still intact

A football analyst once attributed the sudden exodus of local players to the foreign lands to poor state of the nation’s sport facilities. That is why our good and promising athletes flee in search of greener pastures abroad to bolster their career. Nigeria has lost many athletes to the lack of government policies on sport development.

In England and other notable western nations, government invests heavily in sport and its human potential. The Nigerian government seems not to see sport as good business, possibly because it has never been run by professionals.

This has been left as such over the years, thus taking its toll on the country’s stadia, including the 60,491-seater, ultra-modern Abuja national edifice, built as recently as 2003.

A former Director-General of the National Sports Commission, Dr. Amos Adamu, said, recently, that the poor state of the national stadia was not due to lack of proper maintenance as being bandied, but as a result of poor funding by the Federal Government. So, for how long shall we relish this blame game?

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