Rather than winning medals, Team Nigeria’s participation at the 2015 IAAF World Championships was tainted with controversy, as other nations and athletes proved their mettle at the games, reports ’TANA AIYEJINA
Prior to the 2015 International Association of Athletics Federations World Championships in Beijing, Nigeria had managed eight medals: four silver and four bronze, since the competition began in 1983.

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It didn’t look like it was going to change in China. The women’s 4x400m relay team will compete on the final day (today) of the competition, the country’s last chance of winning a medal in Beijing.
Despite making the long trip to China with 17 athletes, sprinter and captain of the team, Blessing Okagbare, was the only athlete with a realistic chance of mounting the podium once again.
Okagbare was scheduled to compete in the 100m, 200m and 4x100m relay events in Beijing. After a poor outing in the 100m final, where she emerged last, a hamstring injury reportedly stopped her from competing in the 200m. She also failed to compete in the 4x100m relays for women.
In the high jump event, Doreen Amata (women) and Tosin Oke (men) managed a final place finish while the likes of Weyinmi Lindsay (100m hurdles), Amaka Ogoegbunam (400m hurdles) and Tega Odele (200m) only made up the numbers in their events.
Olympian Christy Opara-Thompson said the poor showing of the Nigerian team didn’t come as a surprise to her.
The Barcelona ’92 Olympic Games 4x100m bronze medallist said poor preparations, as always, was the country’s undoing in Beijing.
“Lack of preparations has always been the bane of our sports and it saddens me when we repeat the same thing. This is not a mistake, it’s an act of negligence.
“Nigeria should be in the class of the US, Jamaica and Bahamas because we are all blacks. We are even better endowed than the Kenyans but we don’t prepare adequately for competitions,” Opara-Thompson, a gold medallist at the 1994 Commonwealth Games, said.
She added, “As a country, we are big enough to produce three teams. We should have been competing with our Team B in Bejing, while Team A and B should be used for the Olympics and the All Africa Games. But we’ve bluntly refused to do the right thing. What goes into their pockets is the right thing,”
She believed the over-reliance on Okagbare also affected the team.
She added, “It does not make sense to celebrate Blessing alone. Where are the others? A tree cannot make a forest. In my time, we had at least eight athletes in each event. If you were out, others will take your place.
“But we now have a situation where we have only Blessing; once she’s injured, it’s over for Nigeria.”
Controversies
As has become the norm in international competitions, Team Nigeria’s participation in Beijing did come with its controversies.
First, the alleged exclusion of up-and-coming triple jumper Olumide Olamigoke, who got a wild card to compete in Beijing, by the Athletic Federation of Nigeria, raised eyebrows back home.
No doubt, Okagbare was seen as Nigeria’s major medal hopeful. However, after a disappointing performance in the 100m final, where she placed 8th in 11.02secs, athletics buffs were hoping she would make up in the 200m event.
But she failed to show up in the 200m heats sparking a major controversy both in China and in Nigeria. While the AFN said a relapse of a hamstring injury prevented the Beijing 2008 bronze medallist from participating, rumours filtered in from Beijing that the athlete was not injured.
“A hamstring injury during warm-up on Wednesday prevented Blessing Okagbare from participating in the heats of the 200m,” a statement from AFN read.
But Okagbare opened a new angle to the controversy, when she slammed her critics and those she claimed wished she tested positive to drugs, on her Facebook page.
She wrote, “… As for the snakes blowing the trumpet and wishing I have tested positive to drugs, keep wishing for your own downfall because I am more than what, a foolish journalist, critics, haters and those who call me Warri instead of Nigeria when I don’t win, are made of.
“I am self-motivated, confident and work hard which I am extremely proud of and, I owe no one an explanation, win or lose. Not everyone who opens their mouth to talk or write with a pen in the name of journalism, have their sanity intact and they know themselves.”
AFN boss, Solomon Ogba, also condemned journalists for lighting the fire of controversy.
“Imagine a reporter who was not anywhere near Beijing claiming that AFN officials were shocked when Blessing Okagbare pulled out from the 200m. That is outright falsehood. Okagbare was injured, we all saw it; we invited our medical people and IAAF medical people, they did a scan and they advised that she should not run,” he said.
Olusoji Fasuba, an ex-Nigerian athlete, also backed Okagbare.
He stated, “People that say Okagbare is a flop should refrain from using such words. Instead they should ask themselves what they have achieved in life or even in Nigeria.
“She is a blessing to Nigeria in a time when athletics is at its weakest and journalists should celebrate her as she did get into the finals and is among the top eight in the world.”
The ‘war’ didn’t end there. In fact, more wonders started unfolding. No football fan would imagine the Super Eagles participate in a World Cup without a coach.
Alas, it happened in Team Nigeria’s camp in Beijing. Women’s long jump finalist, Doreen Amata, didn’t have a coach at the games.
Amata’s American trainer, Nat Page, is on the United States’ entourage to the championships, but the AFN left out the high jumper’s Nigerian coach, Kola Adebayo, from the trip to Beijing.
Adebayo, who has been Amata’s coach since 2013, is in Port Harcourt, in camp with Team Nigeria, for the 2015 All Africa Games in Congo Brazzaville.
On why he was left out of the championships, Adebayo said, “Only the AFN can explain that. I’m just a coach and I adhere to directives given to me.
“It’s a technical event and she (Amata) needs someone who understands the technical aspects of the sport with her. But if the federation says they want it that way, who am I to kick against it?”
Athletes slam officials
After finishing in 8th place in the men’s triple jump final with a 16.81 metres effort on Thursday, Tosin Oke revealed that officials of the AFN, whom he described as “clueless”, owed him $2,500 prior to the event.
He also expressed disgust at the federation’s apparent interest in a particular athlete at the detriment of the others.
Asked if he actually paid for his flights to the trials in Warri, Oke said, “It’s definitely true and I’m still waiting for the refund of my flight (ticket). I’m here (Beijing), I’m being owed $2,500 by my federation, who are a bit clueless, if you ask me. They invest heavily in one person as you all know…”
He added, “It’s very tough (competing) but luckily, I’ve got a fantastic sponsor and a great family…I try to give my best all the time but it’s hard to take when you hear that one person is getting five figures and you are getting zero.”
Sprinter Gloria Asumnu blamed the AFN for the women’s 4x100m relay team’s exit in the semi-final.
The team ran 43.89 seconds — the second worst time ever by a Nigerian 400m relay team in the history of the championships — to place eighth.
Asumnu ran the first leg in the team that had Deborah Odeyemi, Stepahnie Kalu and Cecilia Francis. Okagbare should have been part of the quartet but Asumnu revealed that head coach Gabriel Okon only informed the other members of the team that Okagbare would not run on the morning of the event, which she said disrupted the rhythm of the athletes.
She wrote on her Facebook page, “Let me start by saying how utterly disappointed I am. Not so much in our performance but how team officials continue to fail us over and over. Every time we as athletes run badly or don’t qualify, the media rips us apart but fails to hold officials accountable.
“Going into this 4x100m, the four girls they put out there have not worked with each other (before). People can say,‘oh your best runner didn’t run.’ But who cares? We didn’t have a plan for that, which I expressed from day one. What will we do?
“Even our relay coach up until this meet was Maurice Greene but for whatever reasons upon arriving here he was no longer our coach… To arrive on race day to the track and have a coach tell you what you’ve known all along and then give you new leg assignments goes to show how unprepared we are as a nation. The embarrassment on a world stage is too much and disheartening.”
AAG signal
Asumnu, who was earlier scheduled to compete at the 2015 All Africa Games, has reportedly pulled out of Team Nigeria for the event in Congo.
It will surely reduce Nigeria’s medal chances in athletics in Brazzaville.
But Olympic bronze medallist, Deji Aliu, believes the country’s athletes will assert their dominance in Brazzaville despite the chaos in China.
He said, “After their performances in Beijing, the athletes’ morale would be down for sure but in Africa, we always have our way. In Congo, it’s not going to be obvious that things are wrong. Individually, the athletes will give their best.
“The only time we are exposed is when we test our strength against countries from other parts of the world. That is when we know that we are lacking.”
Perhaps Team Nigeria’s troubles in China would have drawn the attention of John Carpenter, director of the American film Big Trouble in Little China, if the scenario had taken place in 1986.
Bolt confirms supremacy over Gatlin
However, as the Nigerian contingent was mired in controversy, other athletes stole the opportunity to carve a niche for themselves in Beijing.
World champion Usain Bolt again displayed why he is the king of athletics at the Bird Nest Stadium, beating closest rival Justin Gatlin in the 100m and 200m.
Javelin gold for Kenya’s Yego
Kenya’s Julius Yego won world javelin gold with the third longest throw of all time on Wednesday, a pointer that the East Africans may be coming to assert their dominance in field events.