The seeming struggle for power in the Ghana Olympic Committee (GOC) is completely uncalled for. It looks like we have two presidents in the person of Benson Baba who has headed the GOC for the past 13 years and Prof Francis Dodoo who was elected at a controversial GOC Congress a couple of weeks ago.

This amorphous situation has come about because Benson Baba and some of his executives boycotted the congress under review and the new members of the various sports associations that legally constitute the Olympic Committee went ahead and elected new officers.

Baba’s beef is that since he was the incumbent president at the time of the congress, he had the sole mandate to organize the polls. To him therefore the elections were null and void. Indeed, he reported the conduct of the elections to the International Olympic Committee and the Association of National Olympic Committees of Africa (ANOCA).

One thought ANOCA would investigate the matter before issuing out a decree condemning the conduct of the elections and even imputing external interference in Olympic Committee affairs. Meanwhile, Baba had gone out to be elected Vice President of ANOCA implying that he was still in charge of the Ghana Olympic Committee.

The truth of the matter is that, at the time Baba fought for the ANOCA executive post he had been removed as chairman of the Ghana Handball Association, a position that qualified him to be a member of the Ghana Olympic Committee in the first place.

Fast track to the controversial congress and you realise that Baba attended the ANOCA Congress at the time the National Sports Council had announced new chairmen and members for all the sports associations that constitute the Ghana Olympic Committee. Technically therefore, it could be argued that Baba had ceased to be chairman of the Handball Association and ipso facto member of the GOC.

The irony is that, Baba had sought to use the former members for the elections and this was stoutly opposed by the newly elected chairmen of the various associations. Having created a stalemate, Baba stormed out of the meeting but the new members invoked a clause in the GOC constitution and the polls went ahead.

From time immemorial, it has been the prerogative of the National Sports Council to select all chairmen and members of the various sports associations who then meet to pick officers for the National Olympic Committee. That is how Baba rose to become GOC boss immediately after the 1996 Olympics replacing Peter Portugbe in a stormy election.

From the late H, P, Nyemitei, to the late Justice D.F.Annan, to Dr Nkansa- Gyan, to the late K.N.Owusu, Peter Portugbe then B.T.Baba who has been GOC boss for the past 13 years, it has been the same procedure and there have been no qualms whatsoever. It is therefore strange that anybody should attempt to give the impression that some external forces are trying to interfere in National Olympic Committee affairs. This is unsporting.

Over the years, the Ghana Olympic Committee has maintained a respectable place in the administration of sports in the country. I have been privileged to work intimately with the GOC for some years .I was press attaché to the Ghana Olympic team in both the 1988 Olympics in Seoul and Barcelona 1992. I was an active member when President Atta Mills was vice president of the Ghana Olympic Committee and when the current Chief of Staff John Newman was Secretary General of the GOC.

The Olympic movement is a sacred entity and a symbol of fairplay in sports. Ghana has a wonderful track record in the Olympic family and this fine record must not be allowed to be tarnished by any individual or group of individuals.

I suggest that the International Olympic Committee must be put in the right picture of events in the Ghana Olympic Committee so that this seeming struggle for executive positions in the GOC is stopped. Ghana deserves better.

Cheers and keep loving sports.

From My Archives

July 14th 1999: The International Tennis Federation(ITF) has voted to allow larger tennis balls to be introduced as an experiment to slow down the men’s game.