The National Olympic Committee’s Chef de Mission Unisa Deen Kargbo, is pleading with all local sports federations to submit the names of athletes for accreditation to the London Olympics in July this year.
Speaking with Politico, Kargbo expressed disappointment that a good number of the associations have failed to meet two deadlines, “we have always told them that to go for the Olympic games you need a long list of names for accreditation and that the official date for close of application deadline will be the first week of March” adding that “we were expecting all associations to have finished their accreditation process, and we start to check for mistakes to correct them...”
Some of these associations he went on have not even agreed on who to accredit, a situation he describes as ‘very much disappointing and difficult’.
He disclosed that only weightlifting has completed the process, wrestling needs to finish with the height of its athletes and Boxing and Table tennis submitted incomplete lists, some without passport numbers and photos.
Cycling, Athletics and Judo have yet to submit, highlighting that fencing are expressing interest to go to the games. Asked whether they will be considered, he said that decision will be taken at the International Games Local Organising Committee (IGLOC) meeting.
On whether Swimming will be representing Sierra Leone he replied that several correspondences have been sent to the association, and they never came back to them “we do not know whether they have interest to attend the Olympics games, we just hear that they are doing trials and for what we can’t say’.
The Olympic Solidarity (OS) within the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in its scholarship project for the 2012 London Olympics towards qualifying, has granted three athletes Ibrahim Turay and Rebecca Ansumana (Athletics) and Abdulai Rogers (Wrestling), scholarships to undergo effective training at the High Performance Training Center and the FILE Wrestling Training Center in Dakar respectively.
According to Kargbo, the Wrestler has been registered by his association and the NOC has also applied for the wild card entry for him.
