3rd Generation Nigerians Abroad

What are you doing so that your sons and daughters abroad preserve our culture and tradition.....

On the 8th of July 2012, the Nigerian basketball team put their names in the record books as they qualified for the Olympic basketball event for the first time in their history. In addition, with that level of success comes with it a level of criticism. In the past weeks, critics have labelled the Nigerian team as “second rate Americans “ “Americans playing for Nigeria” and even SB Nation editor Tom Ziller wrote the following “Nigeria is a part of the wave of teams who have heavily recruited NCAA and NBA players with ties to the nation. Instead of focusing on homegrown talents, Nigeria and other nations have "recruited" players who never lived in the country or played in their youth teams in international competition”. Even more disheartening is the fact that a minority of Nigerians have also criticized the team stating that majority of the players in the current squad do not speak any Nigerian language, have never been to the country, do not eat the food, and are only Nigerian by name.

With all that said, I think it is only right that we address the issue with the right facts. The first question that we need to ask ourselves is, what or who is a Nigerian? In the context of this article, this is not a simple question when you take into account the continuous exodus of Nigerians from the continent that started in the mid 70’s and continued throughout the 90’s due to political and economical issues. Nigerians now form one of the largest group of people living in Diaspora, it is even said that one out of five Africans is a Nigerian. In America and England especially, Nigerians form one of the largest foreign communities living in that region thanks to the common language and history that they share. It then shouldn’t be a surprise that we now find second and even third generation Nigerians living abroad, examples are sports personalities like Andre Iguodala, Jahlil Okafor and Nneka Ogwumike for the US, and Anthony Joshua, Phillips Idowu and Christine Ohurougu for England.

A rule of survival tells us that when you live in a foreign land, it is only natural that you absorb yourself into the lifestyles and behaviours of the community. This is why most Nigerian kids born in Diaspora often go through conflicts with their parents who had more of a Nigerian upbringing. This issue often ends up in two different results; either accepting the Nigerian culture and carrying on the various traditions such as food, name, family customs etc, or disengaging with the tradition completely, as they feel more comfortable with their present surrounding and are not able to blend the native and foreign culture together , and even going as far as resenting their parents culture seeing it as backwards.

So my question to the critics is; what do you call the group of people that choose to identify with elements of their Nigerian culture and traditions, even though they have never been to Nigeria? Take for example my cousins, they were born and raised in Germany, yet speak the Yoruba language with the highest of diction, even better than some that live in Nigeria today, would you consider them German or Nigerian? I myself was born outside Nigeria and grew up in five different countries including Nigeria, will I still be considered Nigerian, taking into account that you might not think I speak like one.

Back to the current Nigerian basketball team or so called “Nigerian-Americans”, it has been said that only three members of the squad were born in Nigeria, which is correct, those three are Tony Skinn, Ejike Ugboaja and Olumide Oyedeji. With that being said, it should also be noted that Solomon Alabi, Michael Eric and Festus Ezeli, all Nigerian born and raised players were invited to the team but did not accept the invitation because of NBA commitments. Additionally, three members of the current team, Derrick Obasohan, Chamberlain Oguchi and Ekene Ibekwe have all been with the Nigerian team since 2005, that’s seven years ago when they were in their early 20’s. Two other players Ade Dagunuro and Ike Diogu have given interviews recently where they spoke about being brought up in the Nigerian way of life even though they lived in America, Dagunduro who was raised in Inglewood California even stated that he loves pounded yam, drinks gari for breakfast and enjoys his rice and stew. Sounds very “Nigerian” to me.

Going back to 1992, a certain Hakeem Olajuwon who was born and raised in the inner parts of Lagos, and still speaks with a distinct Yoruba accent chose to represent the USA in that year’s Summer Olympic games. I do not recall him being criticized heavily from any part of the media for his decision. Additionally, Great Britain, Portugal and Spain accepted the likes of Tiffany Ofili Porter, Francis Obikwelu and Glory Alozie with open arms even though they have no blood relation to the country or never grew up there.

The point I am trying to make is this, with the growing number of Nigerian-born kids living abroad, we are going to get more and more kids opting to represent the country of their fatherland, and who are we to judge or criticize them if that option is genuinely there. After all, if not for a Nigerian, who took the sacrifice to leave their homeland and make a new one in a foreign land, and sometimes holding two jobs and going to school at the same time, they will not be where they are, or who they are today. I’m sure most Nigerian kids living abroad have gone through enough beatings, attended various Church sermons and stuffed themselves with plenty of jollof rice for them not to be accepted as Nigerian.

For me I think the only issue we should be concerned about is how the infusion of foreign-based players in the basketball team will help develop our local talent (which coincidentally the same issue the Nigerian football team is facing as well). Currently we still have a lot of local talent coming through the ranks, the likes of Talib Zanna, Festus Ezeli, Michael Eric, Chu Maduabum, Maurice Aniefiok, Chris Obekpa and God’s Gift Achiuwa were all born and raised in Nigeria, but are now playing basketball at the highest level in America after being spoted by scouts in local camps. What we really need to do is put more pressure on our Sports Ministry to allocate more funds to the development of our local league, youth teams and sporting facilities. There is just too much talent in Nigerian basketball for us not to be ranked amongst the best in the World.

In conclusion, I don’t know about you but I will be supporting the Nigerian team whether they came from the back streets of Iyana-Ipaja or the suburbs of South-side Chicago, If you cant do it for the players, you need to do it for their parents, who made the sacrifice for their kids. Names like Diogu, Dagunduro, Oludewa, Oguchi, Obasohan, Aminu and Oruche all sound Nigerian to me, and they worked their butt off to put Nigeria back on the sporting map. This is a proud moment, and folks need to realise that the country Nigeria has evolved and its bigger that just the land mass, A certain Nigeria proverbs states, “However far the stream flows, it never forgets its source” It’s time for everyone to embrace the Nigerian basketball team whether your are living in Nigeria or leaving abroad.....