When the Dakar 2026 Youth Olympic Games open  tomorrow, 31 October, the Olympic Movement will stage its first event on African soil. Nigeria, a Youth Olympics regular since Singapore 2010, sends 19 athletes in six sports, with cash rewards for medallists, a brief to compete with pride and a hope from IOC President Kirsty Coventry that every young athlete believes the impossible is possible, writes MORAKINYO ABODUNRIN

At the send-forth in Abuja on Tuesday, the heads of the National Sports Commission (NSC) and the Nigeria Olympic Committee (NOC) gave Team Nigeria one message: be worthy ambassadors.

NSC Director General Bukola Olopade urged the athletes to compete with pride, dignity and patriotism, and to make the best use of the chance to represent Nigeria at the first Youth Olympics held in Africa. “The Youth Olympics in Dakar is very historic, and you are making history by being part of the first Olympic Games to be held in Africa,” he said. “This is why I am very confident that this Youth Olympics will mark the beginning of greatness for all of you.”

Calling them “the core crop of our future stars,” he added: “I want you all to stay focused, disciplined and passionate about your careers.” He urged them to dream bigger with the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles in view, and assured them of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s commitment to their growth in both sport and education.

Then came the announcement that lifted the mood in the hall. Gold medallists will receive $3,000, silver medallists $2,500 and bronze medallists $2,000.

NOC President Habu Gumel promised the contingent institutional support, saying the IOC and NOC will look after the athletes in Dakar, and then laid down the ground rules.

 “I want to assure you that we will take a clean contingent to Dakar and bring back a clean contingent to Nigeria again,” he said, stressing that the team must return home safely and without disciplinary or integrity issues. His instruction was blunt: “Remain clean, behave well and make Nigeria proud. It is very, very important.”

He recalled that Nigeria has taken part since the first Youth Olympics in Singapore, said he believes “we are going to do well,” and welcomed the cash rewards as an incentive. Dakar, he told the young athletes, is a stepping stone: “You are going to be the future Olympians of this country.”

Chef de Mission Yussuf Alli, who is also CEO of the Elite and Podium Board, said Nigeria would have loved to take a bigger team, but the IOC capped entries. The IOC also picked the events open to each country, he explained, sometimes choosing disciplines outside Nigeria’s priorities or traditional strengths. Alli told the athletes to abide by the NSC Code of Conduct, look sharp in the green-and-white kit, stay off social media, avoid performance-enhancing drugs and shun any behaviour that could embarrass the nation.

Olopade tied Dakar to the Commission’s grassroots drive, including the Invited Junior Athletes (IJA) programme, which gives some of the country’s exciting young talent a Dakar stage. The NSC put the squad through a 21-day camp in Abuja, from 9 to 29 October, covering medical screening, anti-doping education, technical preparation, kit fitting and travel documents.

Kuti eyes double

Nigeria’s 2026 Africa Youth Cup champion, Matthew Kuti, is the squad’s most outspoken medal hopeful. Kuti is one of 32 boys in the Dakar table tennis draw and plans to chase both the singles and the mixed doubles, the latter with Favour Ojo.

“My target is to go there and take a gold for Nigeria,” he said. “There is mixed doubles in Dakar and singles. I want to win the two.”

Interestingly, he started out as a footballer, until his father, a table tennis coach, told him the table was his way. “I saw my game changing,” Kuti recalled. Table tennis, he says, “has changed my life, changed everything about me.” Dakar is his first Youth Olympics, and he calls it a dream come true.

He admits to nerves against stronger opponents, but his coaches remind him he has nothing to lose against a senior player. “So I try my best, I play and I fight,” he said. He also feels the weight of the shirt: “Representing Nigeria is not easy. There are a lot of players in Nigeria who want to play for the country.”

Kuti wants to play regularly on the World Table Tennis (WTT) circuit, attend elite training camps in Europe and win a WTT Star Contender title: “That is my wish.” His advice to aspiring players is blunt: keep training, stay disciplined, and do what the coach says.

Team Nigeria Ahoy

Nigeria has appeared at every Summer Youth Olympics to date: Singapore 2010, where it sent 13 athletes in six sports, then Nanjing 2014 and Buenos Aires 2018. Medals have followed. In 2010 Bukola Abogunloko won athletics bronze in the girls’ 400m and a silver with Africa’s medley relay team, and in Buenos Aires in 2018 Nigerian athletes returned with one gold and two silver medals.

Dakar, the fourth Summer Youth Olympics, runs from 31 October to 13 November. About 2,700 young athletes will compete in 25 sports across Dakar, Diamniadio and Saly, with the opening ceremony at the Diamniadio Olympic Stadium. Table tennis and beach volleyball start on opening day, swimming follows on 1 November, boxing runs from 7 to 12 November, and athletics and road cycling fall between 8 and 10 November.

Nigeria’s 12 women and seven men will contest athletics, boxing, swimming, table tennis, road cycling and beach volleyball. Athletics has nine: Treasure Omosiwe, Rosemary Nwankwo, Rita Chisom Ezeh, Faith Ezechukwu, Praise Ugoh, Gift Bright, Gift Oghenerunor, Obanla Ehuwa and Godswill Nkemakolam, across the 100m, 100m hurdles, 400m, 400m hurdles, shot put, high jump and javelin. Swimming has Akinsanmi Omolola, Kristabel Chisa Oldeide, Aidan Dumuje-Abili and Kashope Obatoyinbo. Pamela Bawa and Joy Lawrence form a women’s beach volleyball pair, Shukurat Mayowa boxes in the women’s 48kg, and Ringnan Danjuma rides the women’s road race and individual time trial.

IOC Expects…

Kirsty Coventry, the first woman and first African to lead the IOC, has framed Dakar 2026 as a test of what she calls the power of the possible. In an interview, she called the Games “a huge opportunity for us (Africa) to show who we are,” and expects Senegal to do “an incredible job of welcoming the world.” She hopes athletes, coaches, families and tourists leave “viewing Africa in a different space,” and wants the Youth Olympic flame’s tour of Senegal to spread word that the country is hosting a first. On arriving in Dakar on 27 October she put it simply: “It is time for Africa; it’s time for Senegal!”

Her ask goes beyond results. She hopes the athletes “walk away with a greater sense of what the Olympic spirit means,” believing that the impossible can become possible. A teenage gold medallist at the 2002 Commonwealth Games who became Africa’s most decorated Olympian, she says medals are “not a bad thing,” but her own later years taught her to value the friendships, travel and culture she missed while chasing results. So she wants Dakar’s athletes to enjoy its concerts, exhibitions, slam poetry, fashion shows and circus arts too.

Under her “Fit for the Future” framework, athletes’ voices are central to IOC decisions. She sees social media as a new weight, with “no disconnect” between competing and criticism, and mentions a swimmer in Dakar who must also sit school exams. The IOC’s answer is rules that protect athletes from outside pressure and let them decide for themselves. In the spirit of Ubuntu, she also hopes sport gives young people confidence and a sense of belonging.

Ivorian taekwondo great Cheick Sallah Cissé, the Rio 2016 Olympic champion, expects Dakar to usher in “a new era: an Africa that organises, innovates and, above all, inspires.” His advice to competitors: make the most of this unique event and compete with dignity, courage and patriotic duty.

Meanwhile, Nigeria’s table tennis pair will find the field a good measure. Of the 64 players from 41 National Olympic Committees, 15 are African. In the boys’ event Kuti lines up with Algeria’s Aylan Goudjil, Egypt’s Abdelmalk Elsayed, Tunisia’s Youssef Aidli, Uganda’s Joseph Sebatindira, Benin’s Ganiou Abdourahaman and host nation Senegal’s Amador Ferrer. Ojo leads a girls’ lineup that includes Ghana’s Joanita Borteye, Egypt’s Yara Elbadawy, Algeria’s Tania Morice and Senegal’s Marieme Diallo, with China, Japan, Korea, Germany and France among the powerhouses.

Ghana, Nigeria’s West African neighbour, fields teams in eight sports. Borteye is deputy captain, beach volleyball’s Daniel Lartey is captain and badminton player Obapomba Adu-Mintah is flag bearer. Ghana’s best Youth Olympic moment remains Martha Bissah’s 800m gold in Nanjing in 2014.

Dakar will also try something new off the field. Every athlete will receive a Samsung Galaxy Z Flip8 from Worldwide Olympic Partner Samsung, the first time Galaxy phones have been supplied at a Youth Olympics, so they can stay in touch with family and share their memories. The Olympic Victory Selfie initiative returns, letting medallists capture the podium moment.

Medals would be welcome, and with cash rewards on offer the incentive is real. But Coventry, Cissé and Nigeria’s own officials agree that these Games are a stepping stone. For 19 young Nigerians, Dakar is a chance to be part of a first, to enjoy the whole experience, and to come home as Olympians with Los Angeles 2028 in view.