The National Sports Authority (NSA) on Tuesday 28th September, 2021 presented its Budget for the 2022 Financial Year at the Ministry of Finance Conference Room in Freetown.
The NSA is a sport agency of the Government of Sierra Leone responsible for sports development, encouragement, monitoring, regulation and supervision of all sports in the country.
In her welcome address, the session’s Chairperson Dr. Llara Mahdi who is the Deputy Director Budget Bureau at the Ministry of Finance underscored the importance of sports in every nation, dilating that sports deal largely with young people, who are physically fit to carryout many activities.
“Sierra Leone is a sporting nation, and that was manifested before, during and after the 2022 Nations Cup Qualifying encounter with the Squirrels of Benin in Guinea, where Sierra Leone won 1-0 to qualify for the Cameroon showpiece next January after 25-year absence in the tournament”, she said.
Dr. Mahdi concluded by calling on members of the Committee to treat the issue of sports, especially the NSA with the upmost serious it requires.
Before the presentation, NSA’s Executive Director Dr. Kenneth Brima said, “this is the first time the NSA is doing a physical and round table presentation of its budget to the Committee as a new agency of sports in the country”.
Therefore, it was important for members of the Committee to know a brief background of the Authority and some of its achievements since it was enacted in 2017.
Dr. Brima used the occasion to highlight the vision, mission, goals, mandates, values, successes and challenges of the Authority.
Steven Keifala, Director for Sustainable and Participation Sports at the NSA during his presentation highlighted the NSA’s five deliverables for 2022 including proposed projects, revenue generated in 2020/2021, income and expenditure for 2020, AFCON 2022, and the operating/administrative budgets of the Authority.
During the deliberation after the presentation, Civil Society leaders including Moses Mambu Jr. of CS Consortium on Service Delivery and Alphonso Manley of Civil Rights Coalition applauded the NSA for the purposeful presentation, nothing that the problems in sports including the financing of the various sporting disciplines, cannot be done by the government alone.
Mr. Manley called on the government to speedily establish the Sports Basket Fund and have the approval of Parliament so that it becomes a legislature in the country for sports funding by all and sundry.
NSA MEDIA
Website: www.nsa.gov.sl
Email: info@nsa.gov.sl or
efomba@nsa.gov.sl
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