I have always loved the mythical story of Achilles. You know what myths are, don’t you? They are generally those tales told by a people to convince themselves that they did not suddenly descend from the planet of apes and moronic monkeys, but have something closely resembling human beings in their ancestry by telling tall tales of heroes past. Imagine being imbued with the kind of supernatural powers Achilles is said to have been endowed with: invulnerability, heroism and extreme good looks. Now, what would I not do with some good looks? Make the men swoon and fall flat before my very feet and the women green with envy, get abducted and fought for by very handsome men like Helen of Troy was, and very easily dispense good will to all men and women like confetti at a wedding. I would be able to afford it; after all, I would have all these good looks. Now, there is something to wish for.
You probably thought I would pick heroism? Pshaw! Don’t you know, haven’t you heard that heroism is not very profitable in Nigeria, what with the succession of uncaring governments at all levels that we have had? If we had not been having caring governments, someone, somewhere would have intermittently apologised to and greeted Nigerians for heroically bearing up all these decades with decaying infrastructure; without regular electricity, potable water, and adequate security; and with decaying sanity. So, no thanks, I cannot pick Achilles’ heroism; it makes you suffer for nothing. Just ask the nation’s athletes like Mary Onyali, Falilat Ogunkoya, and so on.
I have many times come to the conclusion that the nation’s human resources are concentrated on the streets, in the mass of individuals who fleet with debonair carelessness between and among equally fleeting vehicular traffic, doing nothing but trading. And I have thought, ha!, there go perishing on our streets our farmers, students, intelligentsia, Platos, Aristotles, athletes, Jacks the Ripper, Houdinis, and all other materials that make a nation great while the country looks on. So, I was not too surprised to read an interview recently granted by Onyali, one of this nation’s former athletes, where she expressed the notion that indeed, we are losing our best athletic materials to street trading. Meanwhile, the athletic population of the country is drying out.
What exactly then is the problem? Mammoth, and it begins with the government. Over the ages, our governments have had the primitive and stone age-inspired urge to always appoint people who have no inkling whatsoever into positions that require not just knowledge but a specialised kind of knowledge. What kind of aberration on earth should inspire the government to keep appointing non-sport related politicians to head the sports ministry is still a mystery. What do we expect him or her to do there but play politics of money and chess?
I have recounted the story before but I will tell it again mostly because I love laughing at my own stories, even if no one else does. A Nigerian sports contingent once went to attend a sports related conference taking place in a neighbouring country. By the time the contingent arrived it was led by the minister himself, had held up the opening ceremony by four or so hours, and it was fifty men or so too large! I agree, I may have exaggerated the number a little, but you must pardon me, I was not there, and my fellow Nigerians’ unreasonable penchant for leaving their desks and following ministers around does get my goat. Anyway, I was told that all that the contingent did after the opening ceremony was take photographs before departing for home, to the consternation of the other countries’ contingents. Very expensive pictures, you’ll agree. That attitude just describes our Achilles’ heel to the point.
Achilles’ heel, which is said to have been the most tender and vulnerable part of his body, is the part that is said not to have entered the River Styx into which Achilles had been dipped as a child to give him his supernatural power and make him invulnerable to the enemy’s arrows. So, that is the point of weakness in the supernatural body of our hero. Naturally, I have my own theory. I think that his heel, like any other soldier’s at the time, was the one part not covered by the whole armour which all soldiers were compelled to put on, much like every Nigerian household is now compelled to obtain a power generator set because of, you guessed it, the unserious attitude of our fellow Nigerians to work. Hmm, that Achilles’ heel again!
This serious problem of attitude has incapacitated and cancelled the nation’s long-standing tradition of fishing out talents from street games, schools’ games and any other games to fill slots for competitions and bring glory to our motherland. Now, I hear our brainy sports officials are thinking of going to Jamaica, not to import Jamaican rum, but to import Jamaican athletes! That’s even better. In many instances, I heard that officials would even rather field their clueless relatives in those serious competitions so that the allowances could come ‘to the house’. Oh yes, how else do you think Rome was built if not on that kind of patronage? So, the nation’s athletics programmes continue to suffer want for lack of athletes and brains and right minds.
As a result of this sobering fact, the nation has succeeded in courting a severe case of athlete’s foot, the fungal infection that affects the foot, especially that of an athlete. No, the encyclopaedia did not say that last bit; I added it. Now, I am told, sports grounds all over the country have been taken over by politicians who prefer to build their tasteless and excessively large houses on them. School children’s games have no sponsors, so many of them run their competitive races barefoot in the hot, hot African sun. Can there be a surer way of getting athlete’s foot? I ask you! I ask you!
This country needs a more vigorous sports programme. It should begin by the thorough education of the populace on the beneficial role of sports, exercise and recreation in the life of the individual. Most of the people adjudicating on sports matters in Nigeria today, sad to say, do not even know the meaning of the word and what it entails. I have also told this story before, but I will repeat it for the sake of the stone deaf. Once, my friend and I were on our usual early morning’s four-kilometre walk when one of her colleagues at work spotted us on the road and waved at us. Later on, the colleague accosted my friend and, in a spirit of camaraderie, jocularly patted her on the back for trying to cut down on fuel costs by hiking to work, our sports wears notwithstanding. That, my friend, is all the sports education most of us have around here. Now, imagine what happens if that knowing one were to become a sports minister!
On this world athletics day, I urge you to put on your hiking boots and your thinking cap. You need your boots to help you discover or rediscover what it feels like to liberate your body from the tight grip of laziness, inactivity, a sedentary lifestyle and insouciance to health matters and allow your body to come alive under the helpful hands of exercise. Go out and run. Your thinking cap will then fit you; and, like electric jolts passing into a death row convict, wisdom will pass into you like lightning bolts and you will join me to beg the government to take the matter of sports a little more seriously. Our very lives depend on it.
