Former Super Eagles defender, Sam Sodje has raised an alarm over the alleged prevalence of Paedophiles among coaches in Delta State and other parts of Nigeria.
In an interview with Premium Times, Sodje, who played for Reading, West Bromwich Albion, and Charlton Athletic, alleged that coaches were s3xually abusing young children entrusted to their care.
Sodje said, “Sport is a powerful tool that takes millions out of poverty in Nigeria and elsewhere in the world, the present economic difficulties in Nigeria have led many parents to encourage their children to participate as a get-out-of-poverty vehicle.
“In their hurry to ensure their wards participate in sports, they give them out without doing due diligence or proper background checks of the so-called youth coaches.
“Majority of the so-called youth coaches are of questionable character and their motive is to sexually abuse these children, not to give them coaching tutorials.”
Sodje also urged parents to do serious background checks about coaches they want to entrust their children with.
“I am therefore using the medium to offer strong advice to parents to ensure that they carry out due- diligence from top officials of various sports associations across the country, Delta State inclusive, to ensure that children do not fall prey to the activities of these unscrupulous coaches with their high inclination for immortality and sexual abuses against underage children.
“As parents, we have the responsibility and the duty to protect our children from these wicked people that are living amongst us in the society.”
“I want to also seriously call on all the administrators of the various sports associations to make it a point of duty to carry out proper character venting of individual coaches that are attached to them and ensure that the bad eggs in their midst are disengaged and specifically banned from working with children to protect our innocent boys and girls for the good of the family, the sports sector and the society in general.”
Sodje said that instead of romancing the issue, we need to call a spade a spade and stop the shenanigans before it gets out of control.
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