AFFAN pledges to mentor upcoming Nigerian sportswomen

AFFAN officials during the Press Conference in Lagos

The Association of Former Female Athletes of Nigeria (AFFAN) has announced plans to take former international athletes into schools and local communities to mentor young girls, promote grassroots sports and encourage greater female participation in sports.

The association’s president, Oluwatoyin Aluko, said the initiative would enable retired sportswomen to use their experiences to inspire the next generation and demonstrate that women can combine sporting careers with education, family life and other professional pursuits.

Mrs Aluko spoke during a press conference in Lagos on Thursday, ahead of AFFAN’s maiden Annual General Meeting (AGM), where the association also outlined its plans for the welfare and continued involvement of former athletes in Nigerian sports.

She said the gathering gave former athletes who represented Nigeria at different levels a chance to reconnect, share experiences, and discuss ways to contribute to national development.

According to her, some former teammates had not seen one another for 20 to 30 years, making the meeting an important opportunity to renew relationships and strengthen the association.

“We are role models. We have served this nation. We thought that it is our responsibility to give back to our nation,” she said.

Mrs Aluko explained that the association wanted to make former female athletes more visible so that young girls and their parents could see examples of women who had represented Nigeria in sports, pursued education, raised families and remained active in society.

She said AFFAN intended to visit schools, introduce pupils to different sporting disciplines and follow up on promising talents through mentorship and other support programmes.

“We have mentors, we have role models, and we have made up our minds that even within our local communities, we go to schools. We were discovered from schools. We go to school, teach them our sports, and ensure that we follow up on them,” she said.

She added that the association would use sports as a tool to educate, empower and mentor young people until they could become independent and confident individuals.

Other members of the association also expressed their commitment to supporting its new mission, describing the reunion as an opportunity to restore former athletes’ visibility and ensure their contributions to Nigerian sports are not forgotten.

One member, Bolanle Popoola, said AFFAN helped bring together former athletes who had become disconnected from one another after their competitive careers.

“If our AFFAN family does not arise, we would not have collected everyone or gathered all of us together because we are scattered. They are forgetting us. They believe that our time has gone, so we should go,” she said.

Mrs Popoola, who recalled competing for Nigeria from 1965 and winning championships for six consecutive years, said former athletes’ experiences highlighted the need for a stronger association that could protect their collective interests.

She recalled the difficult conditions under which some of the older generation competed, including inadequate financial support and basic sporting provisions.

“I can remember when I was playing in 1965. I was a champion for six consecutive years. I had five shillings as pocket money that they were paying us at that time,” she said.

She also recalled instances when athletes were owed allowances and had to wait until another competition before receiving payment.

Mrs Popoola appealed to the media to help amplify the association’s activities and ensure former athletes receive greater recognition.

She disclosed that former athletes had already begun organising competitions involving younger participants in their respective sporting disciplines, with one such event recently held in Abuja.

Other members similarly pledged to contribute their experience, time and resources to the association’s programmes, particularly its efforts to identify, mentor and support emerging female talents.

Mrs Aluko said AFFAN was established in 2018 to address the difficulties many female athletes encounter after retiring from competitive sports, particularly the loss of visibility and limited opportunities to contribute their experience to sports development.

She said the association had grown to more than 300 members across the country.

Its priorities include improving the welfare and well-being of retired female athletes, providing opportunities for skills acquisition and entrepreneurship, promoting career transitions, and encouraging former athletes to take up roles in coaching, sports administration and governance.

A significant milestone in the association’s development was its formal recognition by the National Sports Commission (NSC) in 2025.

Mrs Aluko described the recognition as both an honour and a responsibility, saying former athletes possessed valuable technical knowledge, leadership experience and institutional memory that could help shape the future of Nigerian sports.

She also called on former female athletes across the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory to join the association through their respective state chapters.

As part of activities surrounding the maiden AGM, AFFAN has scheduled sporting and recreational engagements involving its members.

Friday’s programme includes aerobics at the National Institute for Sports outdoor court, followed by a basketball game. Table tennis and arm-wrestling competitions among the former athletes are also scheduled for the indoor table tennis hall at the National Stadium.

The programme will climax on Saturday, 14 November, with the maiden AGM at the Teslim Balogun Stadium Sports Bar in Lagos.

Aluko said the meeting would provide an opportunity to strengthen the association’s administrative structures, review its progress, address challenges and determine its future direction.

She urged government institutions, corporate organisations, sports federations and development partners to support AFFAN’s programmes.

“Retirement from active sports is not retirement from service to the nation,” she said.

Tunde Eludini is a graduate of the Obafemi Awolowo University Ile-Ife, Nigeria where he studied International Relations. He is a Senior Correspondent coordinating the sports section for PREMIUM TIMES. Twitter: @tundeyeludini