AFN election: Yayock loses suit at CAS

The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has thrown out an appeal suit filed by North West zone aspirant to the board of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN), Charles Musa Yayock against the Minister of Youth and Sports, Barrister Solomon Dalung, for declaring Alhaji Ibrahim Gusau as president-elect of AFN.

Yayock had gone to CAS to contest his loss into the AFN board in the  national sports federations elections organised by the Ministry of Sports in May this year.

In his ruling dated September 14, 2017, president of the CAS Appeals Arbitration Division, Corine Schmidhauser stated that the suit with registration number CAS 2017/A/5293 between Charles Musa Yayock and the Minister of Youth and Sports Development had been terminated and removed from the CAS roll.

According to the president of CAS, in the absence of any agreement from the respondent to continue the present procedure and considering that no proof of timely filing of the appeal brief was submitted by the appellant, Yayock’s request for reconsideration was rejected as it was deemed withdrawn in accordance with article R51 of the Code.

Yayock filed a statement of appeal with CAS against the Minister of Youth and Sports in respect of the Electoral Committee’s announcement on June 13, 2017 at the main bowl of the National Stadium, Abuja, declaring Alhaji Ibrahim Gusau as president-elect of AFN.

CAS invited the appellant to complete his statement in accordance with article R 51 of the Code of Sports-related Arbitration within a deadline of two days which he failed to provide proof of timely filing of his appeal brief .

Consequently, his appeal was deemed withdrawn.

This puts to rest the controversy on the electral victory of Ibrahim Gusau who emerged from the North West zone.