Nigerian athletes: Rescue us, rescue me
By Levi Obijiofor
AS we approach the second week of the ongoing Olympic Games in Athens, Greece, and as our high expectations give way to rising frustration, any one who is proud to be a Nigerian should not be swearing and cursing the devil for the appalling performance by Nigerian sportsmen and women. We should be bombarding the Nigerian camp with emergency calls; we should be sending to the Nigerian camp fax, SMS and SOS messages requesting our sports representatives and their dawdling officials to rescue Nigeria and the rest of us from international humiliation in Athens.
One of the founding fathers of the Olympic games argued in the early days of the games that there is more honour in participating at the games than striving to win by foul means. That was many decades ago. That belief no longer upholds. In the 21st century the philosophical assumptions that underpinned the mere spirit of sportsmanship and participation at the Olympic games have shifted. In essence, it is no longer fashionable to participate at the Olympic games for the sake of participation, or in the spirit of sportsmanship.
In the new millennium and even before that, global sport has become a source of global honour, a source of global marketing of athletes and a source of global marketing of sporting merchandise. In the history of the Olympic games, some athletes have been known to strike gold, literally and metaphorically. Poor athletes who triumphed in past games have been transformed into wealthy and popular media stars. We may condemn and rebuke athletes who strive for Olympic glory at all costs (through consumption of illicit drugs and performance enhancing substances), but beneath the outer layer of their skins lies an unquenchable thirst to excel, to win international glory, reputation and money. Triumph at the Olympic games can change anyone's life, as much as it can change a country's image. It has happened before. And it is still impacting the lives and lifestyle of athletes who conquer at the games.
In the light of the poor performance by Nigerian sportsmen and women at the current games, you might be tempted to argue that it is now probably more honourable if Nigeria had stayed away from the games. There is no point participating in a global sporting contest just for participation. If you do not prepare for the games, don't expect miracles to help you win medals.
We cannot expect to upstage sportsmen and women from other countries who went through tough training routines and schedules in preparation for the Olympic games. Lack of preparation or lack of adequate preparation is a major reason why some people fail to achieve their sport objectives. No one should be upset that our sportsmen and women failed to win any medal more than 12 days since the games started in Athens. We cannot expect to harvest crops that we did not plant. We cannot expect our sportsmen and women to take gold, silver and bronze from the rest of the world if they do not deserve them. Before our sportsmen and women departed for Athens, optimism was so high that even our political and sporting leaders predicted a minimum of 10 medals. It is now clear that our leaders raised the performance bar or scale too high for our sports representatives. We are now scaling down our expectations. Suddenly the objective of winning ten medals (of any colour) appears rather too optimistic. We will be lucky if we win any medal at all at the 2004 Olympic games.
This metaphor of our lack of preparation for the games was reflected eloquently in a letter written by Olabopo Osita-Odiachi and published in The Guardian two days ago. "How do you get 10 medals in a competition you did not train or prepare adequately for How do you pass an exam you did not read or study hard for I agree that not all the countries that were at the Olympics won medals but at the same time, these countries did not bother with events they knew they had no glimmer of hope."
In the past two weeks, watching the Olympic Games on television has become a source of pain rather than joy. You cannot find any Nigerian sportsman or woman doing so well in such a way as to inspire you or to make you cheer. Everywhere you look on the corners of the television, it is hard to find a Nigerian sportsman or woman mounting the medal presentation dais to receive a medal. I'm still expecting to see the Nigerian flag raised at least in one medal presentation ceremony. At work everyday, my colleagues constantly taunt me with the funny question: "where is Nigeria" The question is not designed to locate Nigeria in the world map. The purpose of the question has always been to remind me about the useless optimism I expressed and the faith I placed on Nigerian athletes weeks ahead of the commencement of the games. In my thoughts, I imagined that Nigeria could win at least a gold medal. But wishes are not the same as reality. This is perhaps the worst Olympic outing for Nigeria.
Was there any basis other than gross patriotism for us to be optimistic and confident about the capacity of Nigerian sportsmen and women to win medals in Athens On reflection, we should never have lifted our hopes so high. Should we really expect the current cohort of sportsmen and women (yes, the country's best) to win medals in Athens when the core of our genuine medal contenders have been forced by their homeland to migrate to other countries. We have an appalling record of mistreating our sportsmen and women. If we don't appreciate and respect the talented stars in our country, they will find other countries that recognise and appreciate their efforts. I mention in particular two names that keep recurring " Glory Alozie and Francis Obikwelu. Glory Alozie wears Spanish colours and now runs for Spain. Obikwelu flies the Portuguese national flag. There are many other shining stars from Nigeria who were forced by unpleasant experiences at home to migrate overseas to take up the citizenship of other countries. Ok, Alozie did not win any medal in her favourite 100 metres hurdles. But Obikwelu won silver for Portugal in the men's 100 metres race.
Whenever our political leaders complain about the impact of brain drain on our society and our economy, they should be reminded also about the impact of sporting talent drain on Nigeria's ability to produce and sustain sportsmen and women of repute. Here was a country that won Olympic gold in soccer at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games but failed to qualify to represent Africa in Olympic soccer eight years on. That is an indication of how bad things have gone on in Nigerian sports administration and management.
Countries that take sports seriously invest in training their sportsmen and women in order to improve their track record in sports, including their medal records at every Olympic games. In countries that take sports seriously, you will find they have established well funded sporting institutes that regularly conduct workshops and sporting clinics in order to identify and pick up young and emerging talents as a way to provide them with the training and encouragement they deserve. In countries that take their sports seriously, you don't find constant bickering, quarrelling and organisational disorder among sports administrators and managers. In countries that take their sports seriously, early preparation is everybody's motto. In countries that take their sports seriously, you don't find regular cases of sport administrators mismanaging and siphoning public funds without providing evidence of accountability and transparency.
In countries that take their sports seriously, athletes and sports officials are appointed to represent their countries not on the basis of their ethnic origin or religious affiliation or quota system but on the basis of their ability to perform and unassailable determination to excel. In countries that take their sports seriously, officials resign from their positions whenever their sportsmen and women perform below par at international events. In Nigeria, sports officials that fail to produce commendable results wonder why the country should be calling for their heads. In our system, officials do not resign from their positions no matter the nature of the scandal in which they are involved.
At the end of every Olympic games, countries that take their sport seriously evaluate their performance on the basis of measurable criteria. Our Olympic medal record is so poor we do not even know whether we are making progress or whether we are regressing.
