By Clement Nwankpa Jr
The ongoing Africa Youth Games in Angola have been a very fruitful one for Team Nigeria. The essence of these Games is to secure the future of sports in the nation by ensuring that the conveyor belt of talent remains functional. Acting on a clear presidential mandate, the National Sports Commission leadership has placed a premium on grassroots sports development.
To show how seriously President Bola Ahmed Tinubu GCFR takes the development of sports right down to the grassroots, he has an SSA on Grassroots sports development. The NSC leadership has keyed into this vision of the President and placed emphasis on discovering and nurturing talents to elite status. This disposition is the reason why this AYG has been treated with utmost seriousness by the Commission.
Innovations like the Invited Junior Athletes (IJA) are geared towards creating platforms that keep a group of excellent young athletes busy and consistently developing with an eye on the elite status. Opportunities like the AYG should be maximised in furtherance of this goal. In Luanda, budding athletes have not just been given the requisite exposure, the medals are rolling in. Importantly, a collection of young athletes who are becoming accustomed to the podium is being unleashed. There are a lot of reasons to be excited and optimistic about the future of Nigerian sports.
In arriving at the number of athletes and sports for Team Nigeria, there was a conscious effort to avoid turning the exercise into a jamboree. It had to be athletes and sports who had passed through due diligence establishing their relevance to a process that had been articulated from the Inception of this NSC dispensation in October 2024. Therefore the choice of 54 athletes in 12 sports was so thorough and deliberate.
And at these Games, these choices are being vindicated by results. A clear example comes from weightlifting. Due to logistic bottlenecks on the part of the LOC, weightlifting commenced about two days later than scheduled. The commencement was shrouded in uncertainty but at last, it is turning out to be worth the wait. Just as the Games are winding down, comes Team Nigeria’s biggest hunting ground so far.
At the time of writing (Thursday afternoon), Team Nigeria has 20 gold, 8 silver and 10 bronze medals. Six of these gold medals came from athletics in the earlier stages, then three came in trickles in table tennis, badminton and beach volleyball, but towards the end, weightlifting has weighed in with 11 gold medals just within two days of the event. This is over 50% of the gold total and still counting.
The best has been saved for the last and more podium performances are still being expected.