By Our Correspondent
The recently concluded NCAA Outdoor Athletics Championships have again shown why the American collegiate system remains one of the world’s most effective talent factories. Nigerian and African athletes in the NCAA system posted record-breaking performances and hit qualification marks for global championships, underlining the value of combining education with structured sports development.
Yet the success stories are shadowed by a recurring problem: many student-athletes studying in the US struggle to honour Nigeria’s call-ups due to stricter visa rules, re-entry requirements, and scholarship commitments tied to academics.
The Veteran athletics coach Mutiu Oluwa said Nigerian universities have failed to harness the potential of campus sports because of poor administration and corruption.
“Our academicians are too fraudulent. They steal at any given opportunity,” Oluwa said. He cited the last NUGA Games, held at uncompleted facilities, and alleged the current INEC chairman was involved in the “abracadabra”.
Oluwa also blamed abandoned sports projects on professors doubling as contractors. “The professors are the contractors responsible for about 97 per cent of all abandoned projects in universities,” he alleged.
He described a toxic culture in public universities where lecturers resent successful athletes. “Don’t expect anything good for sports in our universities, especially government-owned ones. Jealousy and hatred are everywhere,” he said.
Olabanji Oyebusi, CEO of Dynamic Athletics Hub, backed Oluwa’s view and called for urgent reforms. He pointed to Ghana, where student hostels have air conditioning, and the University of Botswana, which sits next to the national stadium and runs its own world-class facilities.
“When the educational environment is not conducive, students graduate with the mindset of escaping poverty first, sometimes at the expense of the collective good,” Oyebusi said. “Improving infrastructure will foster collaboration and long-term national progress.”
Sports journalist Ben Efe summed up the gap: “School sports is big business in the USA. We haven’t started yet in Nigeria.”
Oluwa argued efficient administration matters more than huge budgets. He recalled Obafemi Awolowo University and Ahmadu Bello University producing champions through targeted scholarships.
“You imagine the last NUGA was won with 22 scholarship students. Easy to manage, flew them in and out,” he said. By contrast, he accused federal and state universities of taking hundreds of students to competitions, “dumping them in unconducive environments” and paying athletes “peanuts” despite approved allowances.
*The challenge ahead*
While the NCAA keeps producing world-class athletes, stakeholders say Nigeria must build its own sustainable university sports model instead of relying on the foreign pipeline.
The success of Nigerians abroad shows what’s possible with good facilities, transparent administration, and institutional commitment. The question, they say, is whether Nigerian universities can replicate those conditions at home so student-athletes can thrive both in class and on the track.
