Dear Sports
minister, I do not want to repeat the useless question that some journalists
asked you so I won’t dare to ask you about the AFCON budget.
Ghana handball association
I will like to get
this clear, is it with intention that your ministry is not sponsoring the other
sport disciplines or what. Research shows that one of the roles of the Sports
minister is to Support the development of lesser known sports.
Ghana volleyball association
But it seems our
ministry is not putting this role into action. I stand to be corrected, since I
started following Sports I know the name of the ministry use to be Education,
Youth and Sports in 2005 but a year later education separated itself making it
youth and Sports ministry. I have never known this ministry to be youth and
black stars.
The ministry
has even been criticized largely for focusing more on football programming to
the detriment of youth development but that is not my aim of writing this letter, my
intention is to seek answers to why the ministry has reluctantly abandon the
other Sports disciplines.
Ghana swimming national
I was having
this debate with a friend about why the sport ministry despite the numerous
pleads from the other sports disciplines has decided not to pay attention to
them, but what that friend said was “the black stars have numerous sponsors and
also, they have being able to make themselves attractive enough.”
But I totally
disagree with the statement he made, imagine you have two daughters and one of
your daughter is been liked by your friend so she showers her with lots of
gifts and money. As a parent, in other not to create hatred among your two
daughters anytime your friend brings the gifts you make sure you share it among
your daughters. This is what I expect the sports ministry to do.
Ghana judo national team
I understand
that Black stars have many sponsors but out of the numerous sponsorships, 2
percent of money donated to the Black stars can be used to develop the other
disciplines.
The
parliament on December 17, 2013 approved GHC36.1million as a budget for the
youth and Sports in the year 2014.
The then minister, Elvis Afriyie Ankrah
justified the budget saying the Black Stars would participate in the 2014 FIFA
World Cup in Brazil, the Black Queens would participate in the 2014 Africa
Women qualifiers and championships.
The local Black Stars would participate in
the African nation’s champion in South Africa, National female U-17 football
team; the Black Maidens would participate in the 2014 FIFA World Cup Tournament
to be staged in Costa Rica.
The report
by the Committee of Youth and Sports showed that though the ministry comprises
of athletics, volleyball, handball, swimming etc., no allocation was made to
these disciplines in the 2014 annual estimates for the Ministry.
Not to make
my letter look so lengthy, the ministry was not able to spend some money on Martha
Bissah after winning Ghana’s first ever Gold medal at the youth Olympics held
in china, 2014. Rather, it was corporate organization who saw the great thing
the young athlete has done and sponsored here in one way or the other. But the
ministry was able to spend $5.8 million on the black
stars who even placed second at the just ended AFCON.
Hon
minister, I have no problem for spending such an amount on our national team
but am just pleading with you to help develop the other sports, because since
you have not officially come out to announce that your ministry is now ministry
of youth and football then please work in accordance of what you represent.
This complains from the other Sports disciplines are becoming rampant, you were
put in that position to work so please let we non-football Ghanaians benefit
from the position His Excellency, John Mahama has put you.
Am hoping
for the day these complains will be a thing of the past.
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