I visited the Babcock University campus last Wednesday morning. The university is the temporary ‘home’ of 12,000 young Nigerian athletes. They come from every part of the country – North, South, East and West.
When organizing the National Sports Festival 2024, the Gaststaat, Ogun State, decided to accommodate all participants in a single environment, on the campus of Babcock University, Ilishan. Although 50 kilometers, or so, of some of the locations for competitions, that decision now appears to be a masterstroke, regardless of the sponsoring motivation for the state to do this.
While I walked around the campus and absorbed the incredible sights and sounds, I am immediately reminded of the words in our national anthem:
‘Although tribe and tongue can differ,
We are in brotherhood ‘.
On that campus, the true interpretation of those holy lines played in front of my eyes. However, it will look below the surface of things to appreciate the implications and meaning of adopting the Olympic model of a Games village for the gateway games.
Also read: Let the games begin! – Odegbami
Just like at the Olympic Games, all athletes remain in a safe place, isolated as much as possible. They eat together, live together, socialize and share the evenings of relaxation together.
Yet they wake up every morning and go to ‘war’ in the different arenas, who compete against each other, to win or to lose.
It is the ultimate lesson of life, how you can work together and compete in peace, love and friendship.
The athletes live in Ilishan. It has been a whole week since the athletes, mostly strangers for each other, gathered in this new and unknown place. They are superfluous with the fire of ambition to win a medal and one day to become successful, rich and famous. At the same time it has been a whole week without reports of unwanted behavior or crisis. There have been no worries about differences in language, culture, religion, physicality or whatever. Instead, this sea of young Nigerians went peacefully and happily their sports.
I saw them in their sports costumes, accreditation cards that are proud of their necks, while they went their business. It is strictly sport at this location; athletes in groups that go around to catch buses; Or start training or go to the restaurant, happy smiling on their faces such as pancake; Chattering and laughing. It is a perfect antithesis for the stubborn other crisis that means many parts of Nigeria.
In the meantime, the first step is to solve Nigeria’s versatile problems, uniting the country in a common front against the many challenges with which it is confronted. This can be achieved through sport, some of us are on it, among other things.
The village model of Olympic Games is a no-brainer. It brings people together and serves as a catalyst for developing friendships, with sport such as the peace medium.
Also read: Develop a sports ecosystem from the gateway games! – Odegbami
Sport is a simple but powerful formula that keeps the Olympic movement intact, and its members ‘quiet’ and behave. That is why the organization has the largest number of members in the world, and everyone has been tempered to ‘worn’ or to be sent packaging.
The power of sport is a bitter pill for swallowing for arrogant leaders who do not see or choose not to acknowledge that sport can influence and change society. It is too easy to be true. So they believe it and treat it with lightness.
In the meantime, the reasons for setting up the National Sports Festival in 1973 are double: unite the country after the 3-year civil war; And to discover young talents who will promote and represent the country in international competitions.
Both objectives were supplied by sport, until managers started to forget and deviate from and dilute the initial goals.
When a guest state came out many years ago and stated that it ‘hosted’ to win the games, and everything did to achieve that goal through honest and dirty means, the original objectives were distorted and diluted and the festival became an unproductive Jamboree.
That may have been the spirit of the different teams when they started the state of Ogun to arrive for the 22nd edition of the National Sports Festival. That can change soon.
Ogun State wants to put the festival back on the trail of integrity and the original objective.
Also read: My National Sports Festival experience … and the 2025 Gateway Games! – Odegbami
From my observation last Wednesday in Ilishan, in the heart of Yorubaland, most participants will return to their different states that see the matches and Nigeria differently, have made new friends and played a small role in uniting Nigeria.
Two months ago my daughter and her husband would visit Tanzania for the first time. I gave them the name and telephone number of Filbert Bayi in Dar Es Salaam, to call him and introduce themselves.
Filbert is of course my friend. We met on the Olympic sports circuit. He is the largest middle distance runner from Tanzania. At the same time, he was the most famous medium distance runner on the planet.
Funmilayo and Solomon Filbert did not know Adam for their journey. They came to Tanzania, called Filbert and told him who they were.
When they returned, they had incredible stories to tell how Filbert treated them richly in some of the best times they have ever had. Filbert took everything out of the closet to welcome them and to fester. He did all these things on the basis of a relationship that is forged between a runner and football player, two athletes from different sports whose paths crossed along the Olympic circuit, and many years later culminated in a friendship that even the thousands of kilometers they physically separate cannot reduce. Filbert and I passed the baton of our friendship to the next generation – our children.
I have comparable relationships with different athletes from different parts of the world, forged eternal friendships on the fields, in the camps, in the Olympic villages and during the National Sports Festival, decades ago!
I saw a glimpse of similar things happen in the eyes of the athletes I met at Babcock University and had interaction with, from Nassarawa, Kogi, Edo and Enugu.
They loved the atmosphere and the spirit around the Games village. Even the ‘poor’ food was ‘good’ because they understand that cooking for 15,000 people with different cultural backgrounds would never be easy.
I left the Games Village happier than I arrived. Even as the games progress with different hiccups in organization on the road, the young athletes have a ball and they enjoy the experience. They will be among those who leave Ogun State as ambassadors and converts to the power of sport to unite Nigeria.
It only requires a deliberate and ingenious strategic commitment of sport by reducing the various governments in Nigeria to reduce the crisis, dampen tensions, strengthen and involve young people and to unite the country.
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