Governing Bodies

WORLD’S OLDEST CITIZEN TO BE PART OF TOKYO 2020 TORCH RELAY

Published

4 years ago

March 6, 2021

ATokyo 2020 Torchbearer is set to become the oldest ever to carry the Olympic Flame.Kane Tanaka from Shime Town in Fukuoka prefecture will be 118 years and 129 days old on the day she is scheduled to take the Flame.

In the detailed itinerary announced this week by Tokyo 2020, it was formally confirmed that her home town is to be part of the route.

Mrs Tanaka is now resident in a nursing home, but subject to health checks and weather conditions, she is to participate in the early evening of May 11 wearing a family birthday gift of new trainers.

“She is excited to be part of the festival”, grandson Eiji told the American television network CNN.

“I don’t remember her talking much about the past. She’s very forward thinking, she really enjoys living in the present.”

Eiji is expected to join other family members who will push her wheelchair during the Torch Relay.

They have been unable to visit her during the pandemic because of precautions against COVID-19 .

“It’s great she reached that age and she can still keep up an active lifestyle.

“We want other people to see that and feel inspired, and not to think age is a barrier,” said Eiji.

Tanaka’s great-granddaughter Junko set up a social media account on Twitter last year to honour her grandmother, but in common with other Torchbearers, there will be a ban on revealing details until shortly before Mrs Tanaka’s moment with the Flame.

Junka Tanaka said: “I might be biased because I’m related to her but I think it’s kind of amazing.

“I wanted to share that with the world and for people to feel inspired and to feel her joy.”

Mrs Tanaka was nominated as a Torchbearer by the Nippon Life Assurance Company, a Tokyo 2020 sponsor.

She is said to keep alert by playing the strategy board game Othello.

If after health checks, she is permitted to take part, she will beat the record for the oldest Torchbearer, set by Brazil’s Aida Mendes, known as “Grandma Iaiá”, who was in her 107th year when she lit the celebratory Cauldron in the northern city of Macapá during the Rio 2016 Torch Relay.

Mrs Tanaka, one of 80,000 centenarians in Japan, was born on January 2 1903 and has been certified the world’s oldest citizen by the Guinness Book of Records.

At the time of her birth, Japan had not yet taken part in the Olympic Games and did not do so until after her ninth birthday.

She lived through the Spanish flu epidemic and two World Wars and has twice survived cancer.

Married at 19, she has four children, five grandchildren and eight grand grandchildren.

She continued to work in the family rice shop until the age of 103

.– -insidethegames

Governing Bodies

Nigeria becoming an epicentre of global badminton as Francis Orbih enters the Badminton World Federation Council

Published

20 minutes ago

April 26, 2025

Kunle Solaja

Laurels on the courts and now glory in the boardroom sums up the mark that badminton is making in Nigeria.

The President, Badminton Federation of Nigeria (BFN), Francis Orbih, has been elected as a council member of the Badminton World Federation (BWF).

The election took place during the BWF Annual General Meeting on Saturday in Xiamen, China.

Orbih emerged victorious over top contenders from other African countries.

He will join Cameroon’s Odette Assembe Engoulou on the council, while Chipo Zumburani (Zimbabwe) and Hadia ElSaid (Egypt) missed out.

An elated Orbih expressed his gratitude to fellow badminton presidents across the globe for their trust and support.

He said, “I am deeply honoured by the trust placed in me by my peers across the badminton world.

“I look forward to quality representation, driving development initiatives, and strengthening badminton’s global reach over the next four years.”

Orbih also acknowledged the support of the Federal Government of Nigeria, particularly the National Sports Commission (NSC), which he said played a significant role in his successful bid.

“The Chairman and the Director General of the NSC monitored the entire process. I’m grateful for their involvement and confident Nigeria will benefit from this,” he stated.

He further appreciated the BFN board members and the Nigerian badminton community for their prayers and continued belief in his leadership.

“From the day I declared my intentions, the board members of BFN have been supportive, and I promise not to disappoint them,” Orbih concluded.

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Governing Bodies

Ex-FIFA Council member and Mali football chief released from jail

Published

3 days ago

April 23, 2025

Kunle Solaja

A former member of the FIFA Council, Mamoutou Toure, has been released from jail in Mali after almost two years in detention for alleged corruption, Malian media reports said on Wednesday.

Toure, president of the Malian Football Federation since 2019, was released after 622 days in prison on Tuesday.

He served on the FIFA Council, world football’s all-powerful decision-making body, for four years until last month when he lost his seat after failing to contest new elections.

The 67-year-old was arrested in August 2023 on allegations of embezzling $28 million of public funds but was granted a provisional release order by the Malian courts, reports said.

He was accused of misconduct during his time as the National Assembly’s financial and administrative director from 2013-2019.

Toure denied all charges and, during his time in jail, was last August re-elected as Malian Football Federation president for a second consecutive term, with his supporters claiming he was a victim of a conspiracy fuelled by detractors.

While in jail, he received a letter of support from FIFA president Gianni Infantino. However, as of last month, Toure is no longer a member of the FIFA Council or the Confederation of African Football’s executive committee.

-Reuters

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Governing Bodies

Nigeria Football Federation denies owing late national captain and coach, Chukwu

Published

2 weeks ago

April 14, 2025

Kunle Solaja

The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) has denied reports of an outstanding debt to former captain Christian Chukwu and has challenged anyone with verifiable documents to prove otherwise.

Chukwu, a former national team captain and chief coach, died last Saturday.

The Nigeria Football Federation decried statements in a section of social media that the football-ruling body was indebted to the deceased.

Reacting to one statement on social media that claimed NFF owed the 1980 Africa Cup of Nations-winning team captain the sum of $128,000, NFF General Secretary, Dr Mohammed Sanusi, said: “There is no record in the NFF of any outstanding indebtedness to ‘Chairman’ Christian Chukwu.

“During the first term of the Board headed by Amaju Pinnick, a committee was set up to diligently peruse the papers of coaches who were being owed, even from previous NFF administrations.

“That committee was given the clear mandate to verify all debts and ensure that the coaches being owed were paid immediately. I am aware that the ‘Chairman’ was in the employ of the NFF between 2002 and 2005, before he was relieved of the post following the 1-1 draw with Angola in a FIFA World Cup qualifying match in Kano in August 2005. There is certainly no record of indebtedness to him in the NFF.”

Sanusi challenged anyone with genuine and verifiable documents of NFF indebtedness to any coach, who has worked with any of the National Teams over the past two decades, to come forward and tender those documents.

“As a credible organization that is very much alive to its responsibilities, if we are confronted with any genuine document of indebtedness to any coach, we will offset the debt immediately.”

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