By The Edo State Government has said it may be forced to stop the ongoing 20th National Sports Festival (NSF) over the failure of the Federal Government to release funds for the event.
The Local Organising Committee (LOC) took this decision at the end of a meeting.
In a statement on behalf of the LOC, the Project Manager, Media & Communications of Edo 2020, Ebomhiana Musa, said the decision to end the games was due to paucity of funds.
“The Local Organising Committee, Edo2020 regrets to announce that it will end the games abruptly tomorrow, Thursday, April 8, 2021, for lack of funds,” the statement read.
“Rising from an emergency meeting this evening, the LOC says it has to take this hard decision due to lack of funds having expended its reserves to kick start the games.
“Regrettably, the FG is yet to redeem its pledge to support us as the host state financially for the cost of postponements. So, we are left with no option but to end the games at noon tomorrow.”
The NSF was officially declared open on Tuesday amid pomp and ceremony with some events already decided as at Wednesday night.
The event, which was initially billed to hold almost a year ago, suffered several postponements owing to the COVID-19 pandemic.
