After her disqualification from the Tokyo 2020 games, Blessing Okagbare, the veteran Nigerian female athlete, took to her official Twitter handle on July 29 to air her frustration about the nonchalance of both the officials of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) and the sports ministry.

She said in her tweet: “They were busy fighting over power, exercising their pride over Puma contract/kits, forgetting their major responsibility “THE ATHLETES”. It’s sad that this cycle keeps repeating itself and some people will come out to say I am arrogant for speaking my truth. It is my CAREER.”

This comment fuelled a public conversation on the ongoing battle between the sports ministry and the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) over athletes’ kits.

The rift between the sports ministry and the AFN all started in June when Ibrahim Gusau, President of the AFN, announced that the federation had taken delivery of kits from Puma International, a German Sports Kit manufacturing company. He went on to say the timely delivery of the kits would serve as a morale booster for the then Tokyo-bound Nigerian athletes, stating that it would help them focus on their preparation for the games.

However, the Puma deal did not go down well with a faction of the federation led by Adisa Beyioku, its Secretary-General. In a swift reaction, the Beyioku-led faction accused Gusau and Sunday Adeleye, the AFN Vice-President, of signing the deal, without the knowledge and approval of the board of the federation. The faction in June also went ahead to petition the Inspector General of Police to investigate both Gusau and Adeleye’s “criminal” action.

In the same vein, the Sunday Dare-led sports ministry also disapproved of the deal and made it clear that the athletes would not be wearing them at the Olympics. The ministry also claimed it was not aware of the deal and, as such, would have nothing to do with it.

To counter the PUMA move, the ministry then went ahead to employ the services of Africa for Africa, a local sports equipment manufacturing company for the production of uniforms for Team Nigeria.

During the unveiling of the kits by Yemi Osinbajo, the Vice President of Nigeria, Dare said:

“I am happy to announce today that the complete kit for Team Nigeria to the Tokyo 2020 Games was produced with a heavy dose of local content. We thank AFA Sports, Africa For Africa, a local sports equipment manufacturing company for delivering on the production of uniforms for Team Nigeria.”

Nigerians were however thrown into confusion on August 3, when a video of a Chukwuebuka Enekwechi, a Nigerian shot put athlete, surfaced online. In it, Enekwechi was seen washing his jersey in preparation for the next outing. Many criticized the federation and ministry for this, doubting if the kits provided by the ministry were ever enough, and calling it a national embarrassment.

On August 4, and in its reaction to Nigeria’s failure to use its kits at the games, PUMA International decided to terminate its contract with the AFN.

In a letter addressed to the federation, and signed by Manuel Edlheimb, its company director, PUMA said it was officially notifying the AFN of its termination of Sponsoring and Licensing Agreement.

The action from PUMA made Nigerians hit out at both the AFN and the sports ministry yet again. Prominent among the comments was a tweet on Thursday by Shehu Sani, which reads: “PUMA donated these $2.7 million kits freely to Nigeria and offered to financially reward our medal-winning athletes. Our officials rejected them and preferred to use public funds to purchase from other sources. Now our athletes are embarrassed in Tokyo.”

In an interview on Arise TV on Thursday, Sunday Adeyemi, the AFN Vice President, accused the sports minister of being the man behind the shambolic and disgraceful outing of the country’s athletes at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

He also stated that the problem had never been the AFN but the ministry and the minister. He claimed Dare showed his unpatriotic self by defying court orders that restrained him from interfering with the activities of the federation.

During the interview, Adeyemi stated: “Before we signed the agreement, the then permanent secretary in the sports ministry who was standing in for the minister then, said he was fully engaged and would not be available for the signing. He however gave us his blessings that we should go ahead with the signing. The minister and his ministry cannot then say they are not aware of the PUMA agreement.”

Adeleye also alleged that the Minister paid $1,000 to Enekwechi to pull down the controversial video from his TikTok page.