Birth of a new national institute for sports, NIS?

Segun Odegbami

I am delving into history. The past has always been my compass into the future on the issue of the Nigerian Institute for Sports, NIS. This is because the past was glorious.

I was a part of that past. I was present at its birth in 1974. I was a ‘fresher’ in the camp of the national football team that recruited a new set of Green Eagles from the first National Sports Festival in 1973.

I was one of the first set of ‘guinea pigs’ used in the experiments that were the foundation of the Institute. The first set of student-coaches were drawn from staff of the National Sports Commission that supervised the work of the Institute, as well as some State Sports Councils.

The NIS opened its doors to Nigerian sports and sports development with great expectations. The pioneer instructors and teachers were renowned sports experts drawn from various sports institutions around the world, with many of them coming from the German Institute of Sports in Hennef, after which the NIS was modeled with a solid working partnership.

The entire National Stadium complex, freshly constructed with every conceivable state-of-the-art facilities for use during the 2nd All African games, the Ghana/Nigeria Sports Festival, and the First National Sports Festival, all following in quick succession in 1973, was the ‘laboratory’ of the NIS.

That means that at inception the Institute had facilities that covered all sports located around the massive National Sports Stadium complex, Surulere, and more. There were special training fields and courts, cinder and Astro-turf running tracks, a sophisticated sports science centre, the largest and most equipped gymnasium with modern electric saunas, physiotherapy facilities, and a rich sports book library.

The