German sportswear manufacturing giants, PUMA has terminated its four-year contract with the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN).
According to PUMA, the termination of the deal was as a result of Nigerian athletes’ inability to wear the brand at the ongoing Tokyo 2020 Olympics.
In a letter signed by the company’s director, Manuel Edlheimb, PUMA said it was officially notifying the Athletics Federation of Nigeria of its termination of sponsoring and Licensing Agreement.
“We are referring to the licensing and sponsoring agreement signed between our company and your federation.
“As a direct consequence of the recent developments, particularly at the Tokyo Olympic Games 2020 and pursuant to clauses 9.2 and 7.3 of the Agreement, we hereby terminate the Agreement with immediate effect.
“PUMA especially declares to be discharged from any or all obligations towards all stakeholders involved and reserves all rights against these entities and individuals”.
The Athletics Federation of Nigeria under the leadership of Engineer Ibrahim Gusau signed a 4-year contract with PUMA in 2019 and was due to expire in 2022. It is worth noting that the sponsorship was worth 2.7 million dollars.
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Part of the contract is that PUMA will supply kits to all age categories to Nigeria’s Athletics team for four years at no cost.
In addition, gold medalists at the Olympic Games will earn 15,000 dollars, silver medalists will get 5,000 dollars while a bronze medal will fetch athletes wearing the PUMA apparel at the games for 3000 dollars. This means, Ese Brume would have gotten an additional 3000 dollars for winning bronze wearing PUMA kit if the deal was still on.
The termination of the deal comes amidst an alleged leadership tussle between the Ibrahim Gusau-led AFN board and that headed by the Minister for Youths and Sports, Sunday Dare.
The Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports Development supported by the Athletics Federation of Nigeria, denied knowledge of the contract as the deal was shrouded in secrecy between Gusau and Sunday Adeleye who was the Technical Director of the immediate past board.
The minister is said to have vowed that the Nigerian Athletes will not wear the PUMA kits, stating that the contract is “a subject of a criminal investigation”.
Last year, the Department of State Services cleared Gusau and his Vice President Sunday Adeleye over corruption allegations leveled against him by the sports ministry.
Things fall apart for team Nigeria
Well, it seems things are falling apart for the Nigerian team in the Tokyo 2020 Olympic games as there is one tragic story after the other and some have blamed it on the happenings in the country.
First was the disqualification of ten Nigerian athletes by the Athletics Integrity Unit from the games because they did not show up for routine testing.
The athletes protested at the Olympics village as they carried placards and blamed the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN).
“All we wanted to do was to compete”, “Dreams shattered”, were some of the write-ups on the cardboard.
The other incident was the video of Chukwuebuka Enekwechi, another athlete who is representing Nigeria for the Shot-Put competition who was washing his jersey because that is the only one he has.
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