Swimming: Federation Boss Blames NSC For Late Preparation

The failure of Nigerian swimmers to participate at the International Swimming Federation’s Olympic qualifiers holding in mid-June has been in the doorstep of the National Sports Commission, NSC, this is the submission of the President of the Nigeria Swimming Federation, NSF, Babatunde Fatai-Williams.

The International Swimming Federation, FINA, had given Nigeria two wild cards to participate at the Olympic qualifying tourney, as no swimmer in the country met the minimum qualifying time for the Games.

Fatai-Williams said they have not started preparing the invited swimmers for the Olympic qualifiers because the NSC is yet to respond to the letter sent to them on the preparation of the athletes.

“We are still waiting for the officials of the sports ministry (NSC) to respond to our letter. We need to get their consent on our request before proceeding to the championship ,” he said in an interview on Brilafm.

Reacting to the claim made by the swimming boss, Media assistant to the Sports Minister, Julius Gunro, said he is not aware of any letter from the swimming federation on such matter.

He said: “ I am not aware of any letter from the swimming federation. If there is any of such, we would have treated it like we do to all letters that got to us.”

FINA has restricted the maximum number of swimmers to 900 and 50 for open water swimming for the Olympics. Those who meet the ‘A’ qualifying timings are assured of berths.

Swimmers with ‘B’ qualifying timings are not sure of their berths. If the ‘A’ qualifiers are less than 900, they stand a chance but only after the wild card entries (of about 150 swimmers) have been sorted out,” a National swimming coach stated.

With the Olympics to begin on 27 July and qualifying competitions on till mid-June, P.M Sports gathered that Nigerian swimmers have to improve their timings to stand a chance of making it to the quadrennial event.

FINA will announce the final list of qualifiers in mid-June.

—Bamidele Olowosagba