President of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN)  Solomon Ogba, has faulted the siting of a High Performance Centre inside the National Stadium in Abuja.
Ogba told newsmen in Abuja that the federation would use the high performance centre at the University of Port Harcourt, Rivers to prepare athletes for international competitions.
“The High Performance Centre we have for athletics is in the University of Port Harcourt; we just completed our track and the hostels, which is about 75 per cent complete.
“The university has already provided the professionals that will run the centre – food nutritionist, exercise physiologist and all the science-based professionals.
“That is one centre that we believe will do the magic; what the University of Port Harcourt is providing will be what we just need to bridge the gap and correct all the wrongs.“
He said that the centre, when completed would be utilised by other English speaking countries in West Africa, noting that the centre has about 120 beds with air-conditioned hostel rooms of international standard.
According to Ogba, the centre has a cafeteria and other amenities that befit a high performance centre.
The AFN president said that the perceived High Performance Centre built inside the National Stadium Abuja by the National Sports Commission (NSC) would be counterproductive to athletes’ development.
“High performance centres are usually set up in universities; the one in Jamaica is in the University of Technology in Kingston; the one in South Africa is in the University of Pretoria.
“In Germany, everything is in the university; so we think that Nigeria should follow best practice and the right thing should be done.
“But we are going ahead as a federation and our centre is set up by the International Association Athletics Federations (IAAF).
“Can you employ a pharmacologist, food nutritionist, professor of physiology? Those are the issues; can the National Sports Commission employ them? They cannot because athletics is not just one person.
“It’s a conglomeration of people coming together bringing various expertise into one thing.“
According to Ogba, the federation also advised against the construction of a doping laboratory inside the stadium.
“When they were trying to set up the anti-doping lab in the stadium we advised them not to do it.
“We told them that all over the world these things are usually sited in the universities or in privately run research laboratories, but they didn’t listen.
“Now the facilities are obsolete, we can’t use them anymore,“ he said.