Minister for Sports & Recreation, Kofi Iddie Adams, has vowed to implement stringent measures to prevent Ghanaian athletes from absconding while representing the country at major tournaments this year.
As he officially assumes office today, January 10, 2025, the Minister is set to meet with the Ghana Football Association as part of efforts to reset Ghana’s sports landscape.
He also addressed the Norway Para-Athletes scandal and the Australian visa scandal of 2018, emphasizing that under his leadership, such incidents will be decisively curbed.
According to him, his administration will work closely with sports federations to conduct thorough background checks and ensure strict accountability, with severe consequences for those found guilty of misconduct.
Well, you hardly will hear of proper athletes absconding.
So what it means is that you must put system in place such that only athletes attend and not people who are selected as athletes.
Because some people just sit there and when they hear that there’s some tournament somewhere or some meeting somewhere sports related, then they create a letterhead and say, we are this group, we are going.
Then they come without any indication of any training or competition nationally to show.
So before you bring in a letter for introductory note for a visa, you must have proven that if it is table tennis, there have been a certain consistent competition of these persons you are even bringing that have taken part with evidence to show before the ministry or the NSA will get involved.
That will reduce persons absconding and it will give integrity to once again our country and each one’s.
As for the Australian visa scandal, it’s a matter we’ll go into, investigate because the complaints and the accusation were that it was at the very top government where the deputy minister was involved.
