#WritingGamesNG winner speaks about motivation behind winning entry

goal.com

The winner of Goal's #WritingGamesNG competition spoke out on the motivation behind his winning entry and a range of other issues. The winner of the first Goal Nigeria and University of Sussex #WritingGamesNG Gold Medal prize, Oladele Oluwasogo Dare, has spoken about the motivation behind his winning entry in an interview with Goal.

Oladele, a serving National Youth Service Corps personnel based in Anambra State, won with a 735-word essay detailing Nigeria’s victory in the men’s football competition at the Olympic Games in Atlanta in 1996. His entry had a mix of sport history, national politics and leadership.

"When I saw the calls for entry, as a Nigerian, the topic was easy. Looking at the country, and what the country used to be and what it is now, what sports was and what it is now, you can easily draw a line between those things and what they are now and strike a balance," Oladele told Goal ahead of his all-expenses paid trip to Kampala, Uganda to attend Writivism 2016, the prize for the winner of the competition. "We need to look for how to move forward as a country and how we can pull ourselves out of the quagmire we seem to be in.

"Things have fallen apart seriously in the way we run our football and our sports in general. There was a time that if you 're talented, you will get the chance to showcase your talent. "I read Kanu was discovered in a Principals' Cup. Right now, I don't think school sports are still in existence, and if they are, they are not as prominent as they used to be."

Oladele believes sports administrators need to bring about change to the way sport is run in Nigeria.

"It would be tantamount to tomfoolery to want to change the football when it is a reflection of the country as a whole. "The main thing is to appoint good administrators to handle the game. "The Olympics should teach us how to eschew the 'do or die' spirit especially in our politics, and we should be united and let people do sports on merit.  "The spirit of the Olympics is to foster unity; to break down ethnic and gender barriers to make us better people. Also, we should create a level playing ground.

"Change should begin from the leaders, so it can trickle down to every Nigerian." On his trip to Writivism 2016 in Kampala, Oladele said it is an experience he is keen to explore. "I'm looking forward to be enlightened and learn a lot of things. I applied for the short story competition at the start of the year, but I didn't make the shortlist. "This Goal competition provided another viable opportunity for me to make it to the workshop. I'm very excited to attend and to meet other writers.