Senator wants pension laws to accommodate sportsmen

The Senator representing Kaduna Central Senatorial Zone, Senator Shehu Sani has called for the amendment of the nation’s pensions laws to accommodate sportsmen and women who have made the country proud.Sani made the appeal after receiving an Award of Excellence from the sports journalists in Kaduna.

According to him, “Our pension system, the pension commission act must be amended to give people who served this country. We must devise ways to give pensions to our players who wore the national jersey.“Men and women who served Nigeria in sports are allowed to suffer in pains and die in penury.“Footballers that we so cherished when in the field who brought honour, are allowed to die in poverty,” Senator Sani lamented.

The Senator, who is also a human rights activist, wondered why sports is being treated merely as a game in Nigeria, rather than as a multi-billion naira business that it ought to be, saying that there is need to have a national sports conference in Nigeria.

“Sports should be seen as an avenue for job creation. We have not invested in sports and we want to reap gold. “It is unfortunate that young people have lost interest in our national league and are more interested in European leagues. Our young people know all the players in Madrid, Man United and Barca. They know their birthdays and when their wives give birth but they don’t know the ranking of Nigerian teams.

“In those days, our teams, Enugu Rangers, Pillars, Kwara Bombers, UNTL, New Nigerian, Prisons all were teams we grew up to cherish. Today we have departed from that part. Our young people even dump their names born with and adopt names of players.“Our national team is only supported when they win, if they lose nobody goes to welcome them,” the Senator added.

Sani said that as a mark of his contribution to moving sports forward all over the country, a bill he sponsored has reached advanced stage in the Senate.“My bill aimed at decentralization of National Institute of Sports (NIS) is to have it decentralized in all zones. It has passed second reading. When passed, NIS would be close to you and help in developing sports all over the country,” he stressed.He called on government at all levels to stop appointing politicians as ministers and commissioners of sports.

“If you must appoint a doctor as Minister of Health, a professional sports personality should also be appointed for sports,” he said.The Senator argued that budget of sports is dismal, calling for more funding, to achieve desired results.

“If we want to achieve, we must budget more. Tax breaks should be given to firms, which support sports. I must say we must as a people invest in sports.
“For now we are only interested in results without investments. If we invest in sports, it would provide opportunities for our young men and women. If we invest, we would reap more gold at international outings.“National Stadium Surulere is left in disrepair. For over three to four decades, a section of Sir Ahmadu Bello Stadium (ABS), Kaduna is left uncompleted.