By There is a stadium rising in Bichi, Kano State, an 18,000-seater sports centre at Garba Damargu Stadium, and the National Sports Commission under its Chairman, Shehu Dikko, has paid for it in a manner that splits one building into four wings, hands two wings each to two companies, and prices three of the four wings at nearly the same figure to the last thousand naira.
Documents in possession of SecretsReporters show that the Commission paid N4,690,558,485.52 in four tranches for the construction and furnishing of the Comprehensive Sports Centre, Phase III, at Garba Damargu Stadium, Bichi. SKECC Nigeria Limited (RC 1226526) took the West Wing at N1,194,198,626.70, paid on 31 December 2025, the last day of the year and the single largest payment in the Commission's entire book, and the South Wing at N1,194,175,702.02, paid on 10 May 2026. CBC Global Civil and Building Construction Nig Ltd (RC 1262655) took the East Wing at N1,193,515,600.13 and the North Wing at N1,108,668,556.67, both paid on the same 10 May 2026.
Grossed back up with their own withholding tax lines, the certified value of the West Wing tranche stands at N1,257,051,186, the South Wing at N1,257,027,054.76 and the East Wing at N1,256,332,210.66. Three wings of one sports centre, built by two different companies, were certified within N719,000 of each other on a base of N1.257 billion. Two of the four payments describe themselves as 30 per cent releases of appropriation. Taken at the face of that label, each wing carries a contract value in the region of N4.19 billion and the four wings together a programme in the region of N16.7 billion, for a single sports centre in one Kano town.
The payments sit squarely inside Dikko's tenure. He was appointed Chairman on 23 October 2024, the day the Federal Ministry of Sports Development was scrapped and the Commission revived, and he assumed office on 30 October 2024. Every payment in the Commission's book, 99 payments totalling N10,942,469,419.76 between February 2025 and May 2026, was made under him, and 59.5 per cent of the entire book, N6,508,659,127.08, moved on just two days, 10 and 12 May 2026.
The second of those two days carries the deeper pattern. On 12 May 2026 the Commission released seven payments totalling N2,421,357,241.35, six of them fees for pre-consultancy, the design work that comes before any building. Freund Limited collected N434,070,334.88 for pre-consultancy on the upgrade and maintenance of stadia and sporting infrastructure and N332,993,637.21 for pre-consultancy on mini sports centres across the six geopolitical zones, N767,063,972.09 in one day. Arc and Space Konsult Int'l Ltd (RC 1248443), a company the Corporate Affairs Commission register carries as inactive, collected N372,976,744.19 for pre-consultancy on the completion and upgrading of a 200-room athletes hotel and N117,114,697.67 for pre-consultancy on an anti-doping laboratory, N490,091,441.86 in all. Falaha Engineering Services Limited collected N335,679,069.77 for pre-consultancy on Olympic-size swimming pools, and Fassociates Consultants Ltd collected N335,695,738.56 for pre-consultancy on a sports secretariat to house the Commission's headquarters and the 42 sports federations, alongside N492,827,019.07 for work on the mainbowl and pitch of the Moshood Abiola National Stadium in Abuja.
The figures repeat themselves across companies that have nothing to do with each other. Falaha's certified gross fee, N372,976,744.19, is the same figure, to the kobo, as the net fee paid to Arc and Space for the athletes hotel. Falaha's own net fee and the secretariat fee paid to Fassociates Consultants sit N16,668.79 apart. Fourteen days after the money moved, on 26 May 2026, the Commission announced the same project categories, the high performance centre, the anti-doping laboratory, the athletes hostel, the mini sports centres, as approvals of its Tenders Board. The announcement named no contractor, stated no amount and mentioned no payment. The fees had already been paid.
At the national stadium in Abuja, one contractor's name travels in two forms and both forms feed at the same complex. The companies register holds the two forms as two separate companies, Fassociates Nig. Ltd (RC 877820), registered in 2010, and Fassociates Consultants Ltd (RC 1198903), registered in 2014. Fassociates Nig. Ltd took a 30 per cent advance of N391,106,868.67 on 24 February 2025 for the perimeter fencing of Packages A and B of the Moshood Abiola National Stadium, and the fencing engagement under that name form totals N1,269,260,550.44, a certified value of N1,336,063,737.31 for the fence alone. Under the second form, Fassociates Consultants Ltd, the same stadium paid out the mainbowl and secretariat fees of 12 May 2026. Between the two forms, the stadium complex has paid N2,097,783,308.07 to the F Associates names.
The rest of the book runs on the same rhythm of year-end and bulk releases. December 2025 alone carries 19 payments of N1,849,343,546.67, crowned by the N1.19 billion West Wing payment on New Year's Eve. On Christmas Eve, Maijaki Oil and Gas Ltd was paid N18,810,000 twice for two identically described supplies of 10,000 litres of diesel at Package A of the national stadium, with a third diesel payment of N15,988,500 the same day. On 24 February 2025, in one bulk release of 26 payments, the Commission pushed out 30 per cent mobilisations for mini sports centres and zonal facilities across the country, contracts inherited on the vouchers of the scrapped sports ministry but paid, every one of them, by Dikko's Commission.
Bichi is the federal constituency of Abubakar Kabir Abubakar, chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations, and the Commission's own statement of 26 May 2026 describes the new Bichi stadium as built through the collaboration between the Commission and the National Assembly. What the statement does not describe is the price, the four-way split of one centre between two companies, or tranches certified within a whisker of each other.
