Evaluation of Inhibiting Factors on Performance of Nigerian Athletes in National and International Competitions

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EVALUATION OF INHIBITING FACTORS ON PERFORMANCE OF NIGERIAN ATHLETES IN NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIONS (Chapter 1-5)

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CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background of the Study

Sport as one of the avenues to test individual or collective prowess, talents, skills and endurance in a competitive situation, has progressively metamorphosed into a platform for showing evidence of skill supremacy over fellow contestants either as an individual, group or country. In recent times, sport performances at the Olympics games portray similar characteristics of contemporary sports.

The Olympic Games as an international mega sport event has attained the status of the World biggest sports event. More than 98% of the countries in the world participate in the games every four years. One of the ideals of the Olympics as conceived by the father of modern Olympics, Baron Pierre de Coubertin was to educate through provision and encouragement of sport, the promotion of communication and understanding between nations. However, in the present-day Olympic Games, tremendous manifestation of strong political undercurrents characterized by show of supremacy, big time business endeavour, professionalism and commercialisation prevail. According to Wuest and Bucher(2006), in recent times, Olympic games is used to further political ideologies and the line between amateurism and professionalism has disappeared, while commercialisation has reached new heights and continues to grow.

Grace (2009) had succinctly described the modern Olympic games as becoming less an expression of ideals of Olympism than opportunity to prove that winning is ˜everything’. Getting a result for sponsors, national pride, the athletes and the IOC is what the games are about. Sporting success therefore mirrors political success; sporting achievements reflect power of country.

As a result of this paradigm shift in the ideal of the Olympics, emphasis on winning of laurels in any international mega sport events including the Olympics has become the foremost goal of any nation participating and a yard stick for assessing each country’s level of advancement in sport. Participation in Olympic Games means serious business as nations which win medal are looked upon as belonging to the class of ˜sports super powers’ in their own respect.

The persistent poor performance of the Nigeria teams at the Olympics over the years has become a source of concern to the nation. The unimpressive result of Nigeria’s performance at recent global sport events (such as the 2011 IAAF World Championship in Daegu, South Korea, where Team Nigeria placed a distant 37th position) and the recently concluded Olympics presents a serious challenge for professional sports practitioners, scientists and administrators. Therefore, identifying and examining the root causes and factors responsible for the frequent poor performances of Nigeria at such international sports meets and Olympic in particular will provide the platform for initiating the framework necessary for establishing solution-targeted programmes for national sports development projects aimed at reversing the trend.

Nigeria as a sporting nation participating in most of the world sporting mega-events and has occasionally sprung exciting surprises in some of the events. In addition to other few endeavours when the country has made its marks, fielding of participants and winning medals in diverse International sports meets has remained one the most veritable avenues through which Nigeria as a country has gained worldwide visibility and respect among the comity of sporting nations. Ideally, going by the number of its record participation in Olympics games, Nigeria could be said to have attained the maturity and experience deserving of a nation with huge availability of human and capital resources required for world class sports development and accomplishment.

An objective index for practically assessing the degree of sports development and advancement taking place in any nation is essentially by a scoring system of medals won in any one highly rated international competition such as the Olympics. This system reflects the relative fraction of medals won by each participating nation which earns it a position in the Olympic medal table. The medal table can then be utilized for self-analysis, objective strategic planning and future projections.

Nigeria has been participating in Olympic Games since 1952 Helsinki games till date with the exception of the 1976 Montreal games. Of all the 15 participations, it has only won medals in eight and none in seven. A cursory examination of the medal distribution table for Nigeria since participation in Olympic games some sixty years ago, shows that Nigeria has won only 23 medals (3 Gold; 8 Silver; and 12 Bronze) with most medals won in athletics, followed by football, weight lifting, and taekwondo in that order.

The performance curve of Nigeria’s medals chart since 1952 Olympics clearly demonstrated that performance in terms of medals won had been epileptic and that improvements were not sustained. The best performance of the Nigerian contingent to the Olympics was in 1996 Atlanta Olympics USA, where it won, two gold medals, one Silver medal and three Bronze medals.

Since the 1996 Olympics, Nigeria performance has been on steady decline with the climax at the 2012 London Olympics where no medal was won. This paper therefore reviews Nigeria’s performance at the Olympics, highlights major factors/causes responsible for the dismal performance, outlines concerns associated with persistent dismal performance and proffered solution-targeted remediating strategies to forestall poor performances in the future.

Statement of the Problem

The performance of Nigeria’s sportsmen and women in national and international competitions has been on a decline for the past two decades, notably from their historic performance at the Atlanta ‘96 Olympic games , which marked their best-ever performance to the London 2012 games where not a single medal was won! This retrogression has led to much outcry and indignation among the sports-loving populace of Nigeria (Imoukhuede, 2013)

Consequently, the relevance of Nigeria as a sporting nation has been significantly jeopardized. Research reveals several factors as being responsible for this failure, some of which include defective preparation mechanism, funding and misappropriation of funds, hijack of sports administration in Nigeria by unprofessional administrators just to mention a few (Imoukhuede, 2013; Ajaja, 2013 ) . These factors are what this study aims to evaluate.

Purpose of the Study

The main purpose of this study was to evaluate the causative factors of the declining performance of Nigerian athletes in national and international competitions. Specifically, this study aims to:

determine the impact of defective preparatory mechanism on athletes’ performance
determine the impact of inadequate facilities on athletes’ performance
examine the role of corruption on athletes’ performance
evaluate the impact of unprofessional administrators on athletes’ performance

Research Questions

The following research questions were answered in the course of this study:

What is the impact of defective preparatory mechanisms on athletes’ performance?
What is the impact of inadequate facilities on athletes’ performance?
What is the role of corruption on athletes’ performance?
How does unprofessional administrators influence athletes’ performance?

Research Hypotheses

The following research hypotheses were tested in the course of this study:

There will not be no significant impact of defective preparatory mechanisms on athletes’ performance in national and international competitions
There will be no be no significant impact of facilities on athletes’ performance in national and international competitions
There will be no significant influence of corruption on athletes’ performance in national and international competitions
There will not be no significant influence of administrative techniques on athletes’ performance in national and international competitions

Delimitation of the Study

This scope of this study covered the following:

The causative factors of declining performance among Nigerian athletes in national and international competitions.
It is delimited to Nigerian athletes preparing for the 2016 Olympic games and the 2016 National Sports Festival.
The descriptive survey research design.
The use of questionnaires
200 athletes.

Significance of the Study

This study would be a source of insight and understanding in trying to reverse the unfavourable trend of performance among Nigerian athletes in national and international competitions.

This study would help to reveal the loopholes in the Nigerian sports institutions and suggest ways to mend those loopholes.

Through this study, the Federal Ministry of Sports, State sports associations and grassroots sports organizations would all benefit because they would learn of those areas in which they need to make amendments.

Limitation of the Study

The limitations of this study include:

Reluctance of athletes to fill the questionnaires, which they see as a distraction to their training.
Highly limited access to the Olympics-bound athletes.

Operational Definition of Key terms

Inhibiting factors: Factors that restrain an athlete from performing to his best ability

National Competitions: Sports competitions that are organized and held within Nigeria e,g the National Sports Festival.

International Competitions: Sports competitions that involve travelling outside the shores of Nigeria.

Preparatory Mechanism: the procedures/processes through which preparation for competitions is carried out

Administrative Technique: The planning and managing of sports programs, services, and resources.

Sports Facilities: This refers to any grounds or premises designed or adapted for playing sports. Examples include bowling alleys, driving ranges, gymnasia, golf courses, snooker halls, skating rinks, squash courts, swimming pools and tennis courts.

Nigerian Athletes: A sportsman who represents Nigeria in competitions

Poor Performance: A situation in which an athlete performs below expectations.

National Sports Festival: This is a biennial multi-sport event organized by the Federal Government of Nigeria through the National Sports Commission for athletes from the 36 States of Nigeria.

Project Overview

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