BY BOLAKALE ADISA MOGAJI
Kwara State Government has seen a report captioned “Kwara govt renovated Stadium’s Indoor Sports Hall with N72m on record, nothing on the ground to show for it”. It was originally published by a local blog, Informant247, and re-published by a couple of other online platforms. The report lacks depth and is false. It unfairly painted a picture of misdeeds with grave consequences for the government.
First, at no time in 2021 did the Kwara State Government spend N72m on the indoor sports hall as claimed. A careful perusal of the screenshot of the 2021 Financial Statement that Informant247 attached to its story would reveal that the budget line shown in the document is tagged ‘Rehabilitation/Repairs of Sporting Facilities – indoor sports hall at the Stadium Complex’. This omnibus title is as recorded in the revised 2021 budget. Anyone with appreciable knowledge of budget language would instantly know that this is an ‘omnibus’ expenditure line that refers to many sporting facilities. This complies with the standard of the National Charts of Accounts, which Kwara had since adopted.
Two, did the government spend N72m on rehabilitation of sporting facilities last year? Yes. Ministry of Finance records showed that the government spent N72, 485,773.22 on rehabilitation/repairs of the following sporting facilities, with funds disbursed at various times based on the progress of the individual projects: swimming pool, basketball court, volleyball court, and squash court (an indoor sport/game). The said funds were disbursed as follows: N2,283,385 on 29 January, 2021; N6,000,000 on 18 March, 2021; N5,772,852.26 on 7 April, 2021; N27,853,745 on 16 April, 2021; N8,186,420 on 1 July, 2021; N10,405,889.74 on 1 November, 2021; N4,813,579 on 5 November, 2021; and N7,169, 900.09 on 22 December, 2021.
For the record, these projects were executed by Cytech Eng. Construction and Tech (Basketball and Volleyball); Atomike Consultant Ltd (Squash Court); and Aishruk Global Services Ltd (Swimming Pool).
Interested members of the public, especially sports journalists/enthusiasts, are invited to visit these facilities to confirm whether or not rehabilitation works were done on them.
From the title shown in its own screenshot alone, the intention of the blog to claim that government spent N72m on indoor sports hall ‘with nothing on ground’ to show becomes suspect. We assert that the said report is a product of carefree journalism with scant regard for details and knowledge of how budget and financial statements are reported. Worse still is the scary show of arrogance so far seen in the medium when efforts were made to explain the nuances of the issues to them.
It is important to point out that the long abandoned decrepit indoor sports hall, built over 40 years ago, will require at least N1bn to renovate because of the current inflationary trends.
We therefore appeal to members of the public to ignore the report. We urge the media to avoid sensational reports which are capable of causing mischief or unfairly hurt the image of public servants.
Bolakale Adisa Mogaji
Executive Chairman, Kwara State Sports Commission
