Renowned athletics competitions’ official, Akin Afolarin has thrown a charge at the government of Enugu State to ensure they organise a better edition of the National Sports Festival next year and improve on what was seen at Gateway Games 2025.
Sports247 gathered that Afolarin, who is a foundation member of the Nigeria Association of Athletics Technical Officials (NAATO), for which he was the national secretary from 1994 to 2004, is back at his base in Lagos after working round the clock during the recent festival in Ogun State, which he gave plaudits for introducing many innovations.
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The world athletics trained official, who is certified at levels one and two, pointed out that he was impressed with what he saw at various venues in Abeokuta and other centres, hence his charge to the next hosts to make a bigger impact, in order to achieve greater memories in The Coal City come 2026.
He began by charging the new executive committee of Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) to also come out with innovations and revive some lofty ideas that have been rested of recent, in order to make the country’s track and field terrain develop faster and better.
Afolarin, who gave credit to late Coach Olu Agboola, then Lagos State chief coach, for discovering former African female 100m record holder, Mary Onyali and many other outstanding athletes in the 1980s, called on the AFN to bring about the introduction of specialised competitions.
The winner of AFN’s best technical officer award in 2002 suggested, “We can have specialised programmes for women as well as for sprints and hurdles only, which we had in the past. At least one competition per month, so that we can have as many as possible. That way, we’ll be able to discover more talents.”
The school teacher-cum-athletics promoter, who was instrumental in the discovery of Africa Games’ two-time female high jump gold medalist, Doreen Amata, and current African record holder at 1.97m, Temitope Adesina, both coached by Kola Adebayo, then spoke at length about Gateway Games 2025.
He recalled, “I was at the festival and, to the glory of God, it was my 13th or 14th edition. It was good, because the main bowl that was used had a lot of colour and glamour added to it.
“It’s not only about winning medals. There should also be promotional aspects and side attractions. It should also provide opportunities for talents that would be discovered to represent Nigeria in the nearest future. All of that we saw in Abeokuta.”
The amiable track and field buff, who was a member of Lagos State Athletics Association (LSAA) from 1994 to 2007 and was in the AFN’s technical committee from 2001 to 2004, admitted that some loopholes were noticed during the festival in Ogun State, but conceded that it was a successful expedition overall.
Afolarin declared, “It was a good idea, but the only observed loophole was that the venue for some throws outside the main bowl wasn’t good enough.
“Apart from that, it was alright; especially as most of the facilities were new and some things that were not done before were provided this time. That happened in swimming … as they didn’t have a swimming pool before.
“Another major laudable innovation was the addition of Invited Junior Athletes (IJA) as the 38th competing contingent for the first time at the festival.”
The highly jocular and devout Afolarin concluded by affirming that a high standard was set at Gateway Games 2025, which he believes can be emulated or even surpassed by the government of Enugu State when they take over as hosts next year.
“It was relatively alright, and we expect that Enugu, next year’s host, will improve on what we saw in Abeokuta.
“They were there in Abeokuta, and they could assess the standards directly to know what we expect from them next year. So, we expect that they will do better and improve on the standards,” Afolarin advocated.
The veteran aficionado, who has been involved in the organisation and administration of athletics at the national level since 1986, while also attending and facilitating several courses at home and abroad, further enthused that fresh ideas will be added to the terrain by the AFN’s newly elected board.
