By: Favour Bamijoko
The University of Ibadan has at the close of the 11th All-African University Games, organized by the Federation of Africa University Sports (FASU), jointly hosted by the University of Lagos, and the Lagos State University from the 20th – 29th of September, 2024, amassed a total of 12 medals.
First held in 1974/75, Ghana, with 13 countries in participation, the All-African University Games, organized by FASU, is targeted at developing, and promoting sporting activities in various Universities across Africa. In 2004, for the first time, Nigeria played host to the event at the Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, ATBU, Bauchi. 20 years after, Nigeria played played host to the FASU games, becoming the first country to host the continental sports competition in two different locations — UNILAG and LASU.
Representing the University of Ibadan at the 11th edition of the competition in Lagos, the representatives won a total of 12 medals across three categories; Chess, Scrabble and Taekwondo. In the Taekwondo category, Independence Hall’s, Adetunji Sunday finished with a gold medal; on the other hand, for the chess category, UI finished with six medals, with the only gold coming from Ojo Blessing.
Furthermore, for the scrabble competitions, a total of 5 medals were won (one silver and 4 bronze). Enyi Emmanuel and Adetunji Sunday Both won silver in the male doubles event, and further won bronze in a team event with the duo of Sunday and Emmanuel alongside Simeon Okojie. Moreso, both Funmilola Kelani and Enyi Emmanuel won a bronze medal each in their respective categories.
Speaking with Indy Press about her experience, Funmilola Kelani noted delightfully that the experience was a great one, albeit stressful. According to her, in relation to the performance of the school, “we tried our best.” She further explained that issues like commuting between the hosting Universities, the accreditation process as well as the timing of the event (coming in the middle of exams), stressed the contingents. However, she lauded the judging of the competition as well as most of the facilities that were used.
In his own right, Adetunji Sunday, while commending the efforts of the organizers, spoke about the team, saying that the “performance was so great. I won the first gold medal for the school in my sports. I appreciate the efforts of my coach, Grandmaster Osita Egwim in training me for the competition and also his guidance during my fights.” He further explained that UI “got another gold in chess, by the way. My coach, who is also the scrabble coach, and I participated in scrabble male double and team events winning a silver medal and bronze respectively.”
While both Funmilola and Sunday appraised the accommodation positively, they equally noted that the contingent had stressful issues with the distance between the place of accommodation (UNILAG) and the venue where most of the games took place (LASU).
In spite of this, Funmilola Kelani went on to plead that better conditions and considerations should be given to athletes by the UI management. She made this plea in relation to the fact that while they were officially representing the school at a competition of such high pedestal, some of them still had to shuttle, in-between, back to the University of Ibadan to take some exams. According to her, this demotivated those who experienced this, and even caused one of them to forfeit some games. She hoped that subsequently, better considerations are provided for athletes representing the school.
Present at the event was the Egyptian Minister of Youth and Sport and President of FASU, Ashraf Sobhy, alongside other dignitaries like the President of the Nigerian University Games Association (NUGA), Mohammed Bawa, the representative of the Minister of Sports, Ms Mbora and the Vice Chancellors of both LASU and UNILAG. Over 11 countries across Africa were well represented; Kenya, Egypt, Botswana, Ghana, Tanzania, Mauritius, Uganda, Guinea, Angola, Zambia, amongst others.
