We have budget to support retired athletes -Dikko

Chairman of the National Sports Commission (NSC), Mallam Shehu Dikko, has said the commission has budget to support the retired sports men and women in its 2026 financial year.

Dikko revealed this while receiving members of the Association of Retired Nigerian Sports Men and Women (RENISA) in his office in Abuja led by the association’s president, Sunday Adeleye, a former Nigerian athlete.

The NSC chairman while commending Adeleye for coming up with such initiative charged him to concentrate fully on the welfare of his members and apply global best practices in whatever he does and focus on the association’s core objective.

Dikko said, “This is an association that’s trying to put something noble that if we’re able to put it right, can fill some of the deficits or some of the gaps within the retired sports men and women, it will do that. My advice probably is that is there any global best practices for this measure, what are they achieving, what are they doing.

“At the end of the day, my advice basically is for you to seek to what you want to do which is the togetherness and well being of the entire retired athletes. Leave the politics aside. You need to work on the system that will help the welfare and the well being of the athletes.

“Even if you check our budget for 2026, there’s a budget that we created to support retired sports men and women across fields who have played for Nigeria at certain level. It’s very ridiculous to see somebody who has donned the green and white and now is being hawked over the internet that he’s sick, he can’t pay bills, he can’t do anything. At least we see if we can intervene in that aspect but I think every athlete has to have a plan for hir retirement. But at least we should be able to intervene in extreme cases like that.”

The NSC said he had, in the past, pushed for a specialised pension for sports men and women so that they can have something to fall on after their career.

He added, “If you check personally as far back as 2002 before even Nigeria started the pension reforms, the Pension Commission and the Contributory Pension and stuff like that, I was pushing how government will have a specialised pension scheme for retired sports men and women. What stops it is that now we have pension board and we are thinking there’s the need to.

“We have to work to get some of the pension providers to set up a special desk for sports men and women should be different. Sports men and women have just 15 years and after they are done. It’s not like the Civil Service where you have 35 to 40 years working. As a Commission, we’ve the interest of the retired sports men and women.

“I congratulate you on what you are trying to do. It will be good for you getting the numbers and bringing them together and create a system that will help in whatever you do. But my advice, stay out of the politics of sports, focus on the welfarism and the intention of the sports itself. Anybody who wants to play the politics of sports have to face the various sports federations and do whatever you want to do.

“But with this (RENISA), you want to do an all encompassing group that has everybody on board which is about the well being and welfare of. And it’s not that you’ll wait until somebody is already dying and crying before you assist. Work to prepare the sports men before they retire about what is the skill set they should work on. I believe if you are able to do that, you will be able to achieve and reduce the deficit of creating a process for the retired sports men and women.”

The RENISA president, in his remarks, said the association was set up to complement the efforts of the NSC in putting smiles on the faces of athletes, the retired ones in particular. He said some retired athletes are finding it difficult to offset their medical bills thus undergoing very unfavourable situation in retirement and also struggle to meet family needs.

Adeleye said, “We have come out to rally round ourselves and see how we can support ourselves. We are keen to help ourselves to grow together. We are also planning our sports fiesta to bring retired sports men and women together. We have the all stars, we have the athletics masters and a lot.

“The competition would provide a platform where states would be represented individually. I’m proud to tell you that among all sports associations in Nigeria today, we’re the only association that is coordinated to have our plans online where our members can get in by recommendation and not just anybody coming in.”

“Then, we also want to do awards for some of our members who have contributed to Nigeria sports in one way or the other, those who are alive and those who have died or died in active service. Our members cut across all sports. We also want to go back to the 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s and reach out to those companies that supported sports because we cannot write our stories without them, award them that we are the products of what they did those days and encourage them to come back and support the grassroots like they did in our own time.

“We are here to brief you, seek your guidance, support and blessing towards the success of the association. In 2027, we’ll be hosting the first edition of the RENISA games by the grace of God,” the president added.