An interesting development has emerged ahead of the largely desired, much-expected and highly anticipated election into the executive committee of the Nigeria Basketball Federation (NBBF), as two former players are in the race to become president of the board.
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The names that many Nigerian basketball stakeholders and followers are now talking about all day long are those of two former national team stars – Olumide Oyedeji and Ejike Ugboaja; two highly acclaimed ex-internationals of great repute.
However, seeing both of them in the race to become NBBF top gun brings up a paradox of emotions for me. First was the delight, glee and satisfaction I got after seeing both top-notch former players step out to be counted in the search for fresh blood and a new lease of life for Nigerian basketball.
I’ve always been an advocate of the anecdote ‘he who wears the shoe knows where it pinches’ or ‘he who wears it feels it.’ By this, I simply infer that the best people to run our various sports bodies should be those icons who participated actively in the terrain while they were young and fit.
Why should we keep on allowing people who only feel sports from a distance (or are in it for the money) to run the sector, while renowned ex-players sit watching as observers and assessors on the sidelines, only chipping in a word or two in the form of suggestions?
Yes, suggestions and analyses are needed to guide our sports administrators, but those grand ideas will be best prosecuted by the men and women who harbour them in the first place? Won’t you be the best person to practicalist what you know and feel should be done?
Methinks that’s one area where Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) has been lacking and lagging over the years, as no former player has gained the opportunity of taking over the reins in the modern era of our participation in ‘the mother of all sports.’
I believe it’s not a case of happenstance that two of this country’s greatest achievers in running the game of the century were former players. That’s recalling the days of Sunday Dankaro and Anthony Ikhazobor (both of blessed memories).
They played the game to an extent, though not to the glittering levels that many of today’s stars have done, but it’s not out of error that the names of those two legends of the then Nigeria Football Association (NFA) remain cast in gold in the annals of the beautiful game here and in the Diaspora.
So, since Dankaro and Ikhazobor could do wonders as administrators, after the little waves they made as players, how much less should we expect from the array of super stars Nigeria started breeding after the conquest of Africa in 1980?
Without appearing to be cynical, I know that Benedict Akwuegbu and Chikelue Iloenyosi are both in the race to become president of the next NFF Executive Committee, but none of the country’s ‘big name stars’ deems it fit to join them. Are they not good enough to be administrators, or are they acknowledging that the task is beyond them? Can’t we have our own Samuel Eto’O in the NFF?
That is why, for me, the advent of Olumide Oyedeji and Ejike Ugboaja in the quest for the next man to lead the NBBF is a welcome development. It shows that our former basketball players know what it means to take up responsibilities in areas where their expertise is needed.
That gives us hope that Nigerian basketball can begin to reap bigger dividends the way wrestling grew exponentially when a former wrestler – Daniel Igali – took over the saddle. In the same way, fencing is growing in the hands of a fencer, Adeyinka Samuel, and taekwondo is already waxing strong under the leadership of a female martial arts expert, Tayo Popoola.
The only snag, though, which takes me to the other side of the paradox is: Won’t this race between Oyedeji and Ugboaja lead to an enmity that can’t be doused any time soon? Won’t we have a repeat of another misnomer in Nigerian football that has seen two previously very cordial friends continue in a long war of attriction while trying to claim leadership of the country’s players’ union?
Instead of having a centralised body that would speak with one voice on matters concerning ex-players, current ones and growing talents of the game, what we have is akin to the Tower of Babel.
Will that be the case in basketball, as two big men in name, physical attributes, achievements and pedigree go for the same seat at the same time? Won’t it be wise for either Oyedeji or Ugboaja to step down and lend support to a friend, rather than gun for the same office at the same time?
Maybe they should take a cue from the many woes currently bedevilling Nigerian football and accept that a house divided against itself may stand but it can never stand strong!
