 You're welcome back to the Breakfast and Plots TV Africa. It's now time for Today in History, and I'm going back to the year 1996 to tell you about a very special woman whose name is etched in gold, because she claims gold. And her name is Chiawa Chiawa Ajawa. It was in this day in history that she actually took a break from the Niger police force. She had been a police officer to go represent her motherland in this event. It was great to see that she won very well, received lots of promises of a house and all of that, which she didn't receive for many years after. But it was good to know that in 2020, in 2021, just two months ago in June, the Lagos State government did fulfill that promise to her. But it was in this day in history that she received the first individual gold for jumping the length of 7.12 meters at her very first try in the finals of the games. Ajawa had this Olympic good medal in Atlanta, and she also received a national award. And to date, Ajawa remains the only woman to compete at both the FIFA Women's World Cup as a footballer and at the Olympics as a track and field athlete. She's also a member of the Nigerian police force to date, and she launched the Chiawa Ajawa Opera Foundation, and that's to discover new sports talents. I mean, there's so many things I won't say about Chiawa Ajawa, but I'll start with saying how over time, and we're still saying it today, that this is going to be a very risky point, but we're still saying it today that people from the Southeast really have put Nigeria on the very, very best spotlights. And how's that risky to say? Isn't it kind of fast? A lot of people will say, oh, you know, why are you focusing on that? But really, if you look at the records that we always celebrate, and if you look at the names for people who represent Nigeria today in the Olympics, basketball, athletics, even those who you would always see their names pop up here, they represent other countries, still from the Southeast, sadly, but I just thought it was interesting to share that the Southeast owners have, on their own, always, always, always put Nigeria on the very, very best spotlights. You don't have to feel guilty. It's a fact, you see. You're not saying others are not doing well, but these people are doing well. I love it so much. Anyway, let's also talk Olympics now. We're going back to, undoubtedly, if you're going to think about the five moments where Nigeria celebrated, this one would definitely make the top two or top three moments in our history. I can't remember any other time that the country has celebrated as much as we celebrated on the 3rd of August in 1996 after Nigeria won the Olympic gold in football, the men's football team. We had beat Brazil first and they eventually played Argentina in the final, where a couple of goals down, eventually, then, you know, re-qualized and then won that game and won the Olympic gold in football. Undoubtedly, Nigeria's happiest moments in a very, very long time. I don't think there's anything in, well, maybe except in 1998. I don't think there's any other thing that has beaten that level of happiness as a country, but it was on this day... No, on this day, actually, on the 3rd of August, we're just bringing it back because we're talking Olympics today, that Nigeria won the Olympic gold in football. Some other thing that I want to point out here is what we did in 1996 compared to what we're doing in 2021. Now, we're talking Esa Brume and Blessing Oboro Dudu. But 1996, look at these names of medalists from Chioma Jawa, you know, who did women's long-jump gold to, of course, the whole Nigerian men's soccer team. You know, all of them. The names are plenty. Abiodum Abafemi, Austin O'Coach, Celestin Babayaro, Amokachi, Immanuel Lamunike, Babayaro, Gaba Lawal, Mobyo Baraku, Joseph Dosu, Teslim Fatusi, Tijani Babangida, Victor Ekpeba, Wilson O'Ruma. It's a long list of names. There's also for Silva, Falila Tugunkoya, Bissia Fulabi, Fatima Yusuf, charity of Para, who won the women's silver in the 4x400 meters relay. Bronze, Falila Tugunkoya, who won the women's 400 meters. Mirion Yali, who won women's 200 meters. And then Duncan Dokiwari, who won boxing and bronze, rather for men's super heavyweight boxing. That was the, you know, list of names in 1996. In 2021, we have just two names. And that's it. It's a wrap. Go home. Wait for 2020 or next year's Olympic Games. You know, and hope that we might do better. That really, for me, is painting a picture of where we were in 96 compared to where we are today. You know the sad thing that I noticed? It's just unfortunate that when we talk about Nigeria's history, there seems to be like lots of glorious things to talk about where we're coming from, especially post-independence. That, oh, Nigeria was great. Food prices were cheap, this and that. And you're looking at now, the 2021s. And you're finding, it seems like we're a shadow of ourselves. Look at sports history. We beat other football clubs like Brazil, Argentina. These guys were the heavyweights of that time. We beat them all hands down. But today, what have we seen in the Olympics? We're not even part of the spree, so, you know, we didn't even make the, you know, make the Olympics, both male and female teams. So it's sad. You know, hopefully, you know, these are questions that I know that I would bring up. You know, to every guest that we interviewed this morning, we'll see how it goes. And I don't think we're a shadow of ourselves. A shadow of a shadow of ourselves. We're a shadow. It's a terrible team. Sunday Darius after you. Yeah. Stay with us, all right? Our first conversation this morning, we're going to be talking, you know, I'm breaking down the conversation concerning Andrew's Olympics journey. And we're starting with preparations. How well did we prepare for the Olympics? What were the things that we missed out on in getting our, you know, Olympics team ready for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics? We'll get into that conversation next after the short break. Good morning once again. We'll be back.