Nigeria has been attending the Summer Paralympics since 1992, making this their 7th time at the multi sport event set aside for people with physical disabilities, ranging from amputations to hearing impairments and cerebral palsy.

Nigeria’s performance has always been uplifting and this year is no exception. Actually, there has been an exception; the Nigerian athletes have broken more records than ever; records set by others and even their own.

Bose Omolayo broke her own world record yesterday in the women’s power lifting event to win Nigeria’s 6th Gold medal. These athletes seem unstoppable if we are being honest. This is even more interesting when set against the background of our barely commendable performance at the last Olympics.

The reason for their enviable performance so far? It might have come as no surprise to some since our Paralympics athletes already had amongst themselves, 45 medals from previous Games.

More than their able bodied counterparts who have had even more years of competition. We have pegged down two main indicators.

The events and reward system.

The events

Although there are 28 events that have featured over the years at the Paralympics, Nigeria has consistently stuck to three.

Table-tennis, Athletics and Power-lifting. Therefore, the experience definitely comes to play. We have seen athletes like Lucy Ejike perform exceptionally. She has been winning medals in the same event since 2004 with two gold medals and two silver medals to her credit. Her World Record shattering performance this years is therefore not surprising.

There has been a decline over the years with our table-tennis performance.

Last year, the artists did not bring home any medals from table-tennis. For the athletics, there was only one medal in track and field events. Power lifting has always been the strongest suit for the Nigerian athletes.

Of all the 23 athletes representing Nigeria at the Games, only 3 are there for the  table-tennis; an event we haven’t won any medals in since 2000 in Sydney.

Rewards

Last year, former President Goodluck Jonathan heavily rewarded the athletes that brought home medals.

He paid N5 million to athletes who got the gold, N3 million to those who got silver medals and N2 million to the Bronze medalist.

He went further to award them National Honours. It was a beautiful thing and it must have influenced this year’s performance. Especially for the first timers.

The present administration will also do well to reward these exceptional athletes when they return home.