Under-fire and outgoing president of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria Shehu Ibrahim Gusau says he has been locked out of the official e-mail of the federation by World Athletics.
In a letter addressed via WhatsApp to all World Athletics member federations, Gusau accussed both World Athletics and the Confederation of African Athletics of working with the Nigerian government to undermine his power as president of AFN.
”Dear colleagues, Good Morning. You will recall last week I sent a letter to WA President, Sebastian Coe and copied all Member Federations. I did that because I wanted member Federations to know what is going on in the Athletics Federation of Nigeria.
”Since then our Federation has been locked out of our official mailbox (ngr@mf.worldathletics.org). We have sent several emails and made several calls to WA IT Ticket to resolve the problem, thinking it was a technical problem.
”It has been 1 (one) week now and the matter is still not resolved,’ wrote Gusau who revealed that a staff of World Athletics informed him the World governing body’s action was intentional.
”Yesterday a staff of the WA who was not happy with the situation informed us that we were intentionally blocked, as the WA and CAA bosses are not happy with me for copying my mail to all MFs. (I thought we are a family),’ he further wrote and alleged that the plan was ‘to block me from the email and allow access to the Government Group after Monday, 14th June.’
”We have an election coming up on Monday, June 14, 2021 and I, along with the Congress called for the Congress and a venue was agreed. However, the WA and CAA, working with the Nigerian Government, as represented by the Federal Ministry of Youth & Sports Development (FMYSD) agreed for the Government to call for a parallel Congress at a different venue by the Secretary General (SG) who is not a staff of the Federation.”
”The idea is to block me from the email and allow access to the Government Group after Monday, 14th June.”
Gusau also revealed in the letter that he was not consulted when the CAA approached Nigeria to host the Africa Championship and accused both World Athletics and the CAA of being used for personal benefit ‘by certain people’.
” You will recall last week in the news the CAA wanted to hold the Senior African Championships in Lagos, Nigeria until the Nigeria Covid-19 Team cancelled the event.
” The agreement to hold the Championships in Lagos was reached without me as President of AFN, President of CAA Region 2 and Vice President of CAA. I have to bring this to your notice to lend your voice in the call to WA to restore our email access.”
”It is quite disappointing and absolutely disheartening to see how both WA and CAA are being used for personal benefits by certain people. I shall continue to support our sport and athletes as I have been doing since 1991.”