The just concluded National Youths Games organized by the Federal Ministry of Youths and Sports at Ilorin Kwara state has being described as a sham.
Imo State Sports Commission Acting Director of Sports, Mr. Emmanuel Metu said this in Owerri while speaking on the event.
He said that by his personal and every reasonable assessment, the week long event does not represent the spirit of National Youth Games.
Metu regretted that the games which was instituted purely for the purpose of discovering young talents ended up with the practice of age cheating.
He said a lot of under aged athletes from various states of the Federation saw themselves competing with over aged athletes, a situation which has eroded the whole essence of the games
He said: “as far as I am concerned, the game has no meaning at all. It should not be tagged a championship”.
The Acting Director pointed out that it is either the organizers decide to make it an adult event whereby states will come with adults to compete with others.
He said: “such situations will not be for Imo that always believe in keeping or playing by the rules and not when we go with the right athletes only for us to see terrible situations”.
Metu advised that if the organizers do not want to get it right, they should stop the games, while appealing to the screening committee to always be strict and have a standard.
According to him for the event to be called National Youths Games, the organizers should put down the categories either u-15, u-17, u-20, so that athletes from states could compete according to their categories and ages.
The Acting Director declared that most of the athletes seen during screening were not the same athletes that competed.
He pointed out that what most states did was first register or accredited an adult with his photo without the screening committee checking the tags to see if it conforms with the face of the athletes in the photo.
He said: “when they register an adult with his photo, they will send a little girl or boy to the screening and he or she will pass it and because you did not check the tags to conform with the face, when it comes to the event, you will see an adult”
Speaking on the performances of athletes from Imo State, Metu acknowledged the fact that they did their best considering the circumstances they found themselves
He said: “we did our own screening even with the Hon Commissioner for Youths and Sports Development to make sure that only those within the age were taken to the games”.
He observed with dismay that Team Imo went to Kwara fully prepared for the games to win laurels for the State, but saw themselves struggling and competing with over aged athletes.
While advising them not to be discouraged, Mr. Metu assured that the commission will go back to the drawing board with a view to addressing some of their challenges ahead of upcoming competitions on the country.
The Games ended with Imo State winning only 3 bronze and 1 silver medals.
