DIANA-MARY NSAN
The Honourable Minister of Sports Development, Senator John Owan Enoh, has stated that Team Nigeria’s preparations for the next African Games will start from now, with a review of the outing in Accra, as the first point of business.
Senator Enoh made this known while addressing newsmen on his perception of Nigeria’s record-breaking appearance in Accra, Ghana, for the 13th edition of African Games. Nigeria recorded a first swimming medal in 33 years, as well as a medal in handball in 21 years. In the 2019 African games, the country had 46 gold medals, which was improved by the 47 gold medals in the 2023 Games.
“I am a happy Nigerian, the President is happy, Nigerians are happy. The reward for doing well is to do better,” Enoh said.
“For the next Games, our preparations will be better. For this Games, we will interrogate what happened. We aimed to finish top of the medals table, however, history shows we’ve finished top only once, but with hard work and determination, serious leadership and planning, we can achieve this.”
“Preparations have started for the Olympic Games in Paris. The Ministerial Podium Performance Commiittee has been tireless; going through all the training camps we had. The report is that the sports that followed recommendations of the committee did better than those that did not. The committee is not just about the African Games but also the Olympics. We want to record gold medals at the Olympics Games.”
“We will consolidate on the sports we have strength on. The Ministry will adopt every strategy possible and funding models to assist in taking care of athletes. We will also beam light on the other sports that we don’t do well.”
On the final medal table, Nigeria finished second behind Egypt with 47 gold, 34 silver and 40 bronze medal, total of 121 medals. For Nigeria, Weightlifting had the most medals with 16 gold, 10 silver and 6 bronze, totalling 32 medals. Athletics came next with 11 gold, 6 silver and 5 bronze medals, totalling 22 medals. Boxing raked in 8 gold, 2 silver medals, totalling 10 medals. Wrestling brought in 6 gold, 3 silver and 2 bronze medals, totalling 11 medals. Arm wrestling provided 4 gold, 2 silver, and 7 bronze medals, totalling 13 medals. Gold medals also came in from Badminton and taekwondo, with basketball, cycling, cricket tennis, chess, hockey, table tennis, also contributing to the medal haul.