BY OBA ADEDARASIMI
In a country badly polarized along ethnic, tribal and religious lines since independence in 1960, nothing, arguably, ignites a sense of patriotism, togetherness and unity among Nigerians like sports.
Nigeria, as an independent nation, has endured internal strife, ethnic and religious suspicions among citizens; she even survived a civil war but sports remains some of the critical elements that have kept the country together. All citizens relegate their parochial inclinations and support the flag anytime the country is involved in sports. Apart from being a tool for peace and unity, sports has also been a source of youth empowerment, diplomacy and foreign direct investments since it transmuted from being recreational to professional in Nigeria.
However, despite its engaging potentials, sports is not immune to the malaise that has manifested in all aspects of the country’s life.
Maladministration, corruption, poor handling of the welfare of athletes, poor maintenance culture that has left inadequate infrastructure in a debilitating state and a lack of clear-cut policy have all conspired to prevent the country from reaching her potential in sports.
Although, it is instructive to state that it has not been all gloomy, as the country has etched her name on the world map as one of the nations to reckon with in sports since the Union Jack was lowered and the green-white flag of a new nation was hoisted on October 1, 1960.
Nigeria’s glory in sports pre-dated the Independence; it is important to recognise the efforts of Hogan ‘Kid’ Bassey who won the World Featherweight boxing championship fight in Liverpool in 1957 and Dick Tiger, who fought America’s Gene Fulmer and won the World Middleweight boxing championship two years after.
The successes of these great boxers provided the platform upon which post-independent stars thrived. One of such stars was Nojeem Maiyegun who won the country’s first-ever Olympics medal when he clinched a bronze in boxing at the 1964 Summer Games.
The young, independent nation continued to make waves in the 1960s when in a year after Maiyegun’s bronze medal feat, Tiger, again, defeated Joey Giardello at Madison Square Garden, New York, to regain the WBC and WBA World Middleweight titles he lost three years earlier to the American. The boxer, in 1966, also defeated Jose Torres of Puerto Rico at the same venue to claim the WBC and WBA World Light Heavyweight titles. He defended the titles three times before losing them to Bob Foster of the United States on 24 March 1968.
Also in 1966, Eddie Ndukwu won Nigeria’s first post-independence Commonwealth Games gold medal after defeating Darryl Norwood of Australia in the final of the Bantamweight division. A few hours later Anthony Andeh also won a gold medal for Nigeria in the Lightweight division.
By1968, Nigeria qualified and played her first-ever Olympic Games football match, losing 3-1 to Japan in Puebla, Mexico. Samuel Okoye had the distinct honour of scoring Nigeria’s first Olympic Games goal. Two days later, the team lost 3-0 to Spain, before playing out a thrilling 3-3 draw against Brazil.
The country entered the next decade with the commissioning of the gigantic National Stadium, in Surulere, Lagos in 1972 and the edifice hosted the 2nd edition of the All-Africa Games the following year. Eighteen-year-old Modupe Oshikoya emerged as Nigeria’s star of the Games, winning three gold medals in the women’s 100m hurdles, high jump and long jump events as Nigeria finished second in the overall table. The Green Eagles also won the gold in the football event of the Games.
Oshikoya, a year after her heroics in Lagos, became the first Nigerian woman to win a gold medal at the Commonwealth Games after winning the women’s long jump event with a leap of 6.46m at the Queen Elizabeth II Park in Christchurch, New Zealand. She also won silver in the pentathlon and bronze in the 100 m hurdles at the 1974 Games.
1976 was quite eventful for the country as the Green Eagles won their first-ever African Cup of Nation bronze medal after the team defeated Egypt 3-2 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The country also dominated the continent at the club level as IICC Shooting Stars of Ibadan defeated Cameroon’s Tonnerre Yaoundé 4-2 on aggregate to clinch the CAF Cup Winners’ Cup.
Enugu Rangers emulated Shooting Stars the following year as the Flying Antelopes mauled yet another Cameroonian side Canon Yaoundé 5-2 on aggregate to win the CAF Cup Winners’ Cup.
It was a blistering start for the country in the 1980s as the Green Eagles won their first-ever African Cup of Nations title after defeating Algeria 3-0 in the final of the tournament which was played in Lagos.
Meanwhile, table tennis had become one of the most popular sports in Nigeria in the 60s through 80s but the country was firmly noticed on the world stage after Atanda Musa became the first Nigerian and African to win the Commonwealth Games men’s singles title in Bombay, India on February 9, 1982. He had a day earlier combined with Sunday Eboh to win the men’s doubles title.
Indeed, the 1980s continued to be the golden era of Nigerian sports as Nduka Odizor became the first Nigerian and West African tennis star to play in the fourth round of the oldest tennis tournament in the world, Wimbledon. He reached the third rounds of both the US Open and Australian Open the following year.
Between 1984 and 1987, Hakeem Olajuwon became the first Nigerian to play in the NBA, Peter Konyegwachie won Nigeria’s first Olympic Games silver medal; Nigeria’s relay quartet of Rotimi Peters, Sunday Uti, Moses Ugbusien and Innocent Egbunike won the country’s first-ever Olympic Games track and field medal after placing third in the men’s 4 x 400 metres relay.
The Golden Eaglets of Nigeria won the inaugural FIFA U-16 World Championship in China in 1985 while Flying Eagles came third for the first time in the FIFA U-20 World Championship the same year.
Egbunike and Paul Emordi won silver and bronze medals in the 400m and long jump event of the World Indoor Championships in 1987.
Nigeria heralded the 1990s with a strong showing by winning four medals at the 1992 Olympic Games held in Barcelona, Spain. The country’s contingent won silver in 4X100m relays (men); another two silver in boxing through David Izonritei and Richard Igbineghu and one bronze medal in 4X100m relays (women).
In 1993, the Super Eagles made history by qualifying for the World Cup for the first time and prepared for the biggest football tournament by winning the African Cup of Nations in Tunisia in 1994, their second continental crown. They reached the second round of the FIFA World Cup in the United States.
Nigeria’s most notable achievement came at the 1996 Olympics when Chioma Ajunwa, on August 2 that year, leapt to a historic gold medal in the women’s long jump event to claim Nigeria’s first-ever gold medal in the Games. The joy became fuller the following day when the U-23 team defeated their Argentina counterparts in the final of football event to claim the gold as Nigeria left the Games with two gold, one silver and three bronze medals.
At the turn of the new millennium, Nigeria hosted and won the All Africa Games in 2003; while Enyimba Football Club winning back-to-back CAF Champions League title and Samuel Peters claiming the world boxing title. Golden Eaglets have won the U-17 World Cup in 2007, 2013 and 2015 to become the world’s most successful in that cadre.
The Eagles also won the Nations Cup for the third time in 2013 while the country has also done well in basketball as the men’s senior team won the 2015 Afrobasketball Championship while their women counterparts have secured more successes with five African titles to their credit.
However, the country looks to have derailed from the earlier progress as sports witnessed a steady decline since the turn of the new millennium. The retrogression is underlined by poor performances at the Olympics and other international sporting events. Until the last Olympics Games in Tokyo, where Team Nigeria won a silver and bronze medal, the country had returned empty-handed since 2004 edition of the Games.
Games like athletics, table tennis, swimming, boxing and tennis have witnessed remarkable decline in their popularity among Nigerians while fans prefer to follow European football while the local league turned to a mere joke. The poor standard of the league is reflected in the way Nigerian clubs crash out of continental competitions in the preliminary stages.
“We got it right at the beginning but derailed along the line and we lost it entirely,” a former Director-General of the National Sports Commission, Gbenga Elegbeleye told The Point.
“However, encouraging grassroots sports is an area I think should be corrected to achieve better results in Nigerian sports,” he said.
A former Green Eagles star, Felix Owolabi, said the results achieved so far in sports are not commensurate with the country’s potential. He insisted that poor planning, poor technical ability of coaches, poor welfare of athletes affected performance all round.
“We really need to go back to what was working for us in the past so as to take our sports to the next level and regain our lost glories. Football, athletics, basketball, boxing and the rest, we need to do what was giving us results in the past and see how we can regain our lost glories,” Owolabi said.
He canvassed for the formulation and effective implementation of policies that can help revamp the sector with competent and sincere personnel to drive the process.
“Instability in governance is another problem. I don’t know why we have decided to scrap the sports commission, which supposed to drive development. A sports ministry is supposed to be filled with technocrats but in our case, it’s a different ball game. We need good structure to get things right. It will be very difficult because of our fire brigade approach to doing things as a nation. We need to start getting things right, now is a time for reflection,” he stressed.
Former fastest man in Africa, Deji Aliu, said Nigeria was struggling in the midst of unlimited potentials. He said sports sector needs to be overhauled.
“Nigeria sports needs a total overhaul. We need to bring in our professionals; people that know more about sports. We need to bring back life into the sector for us to move forward,” he said.
