As Senegal sets Youth Games medal record, Olympic hero calls for more investment

Senegal is hosting Africa's first ever Olympic event, with 136 of its own athletes competing in 23 disciplines.

As of Wednesday, the West African nation had taken nine medals – five golds and four bronzes in taekwondo, beach wrestling, men's and women's 3x3 basketball and judo – putting them at sixth place in the medal table. 

Until now, Senegal had never won a medal in the history of the Youth Olympic Games. The country has only ever won one Olympic medal – a silver in the men's 400 metre hurdles in 1988 in Seoul, won by Amadou Dia Ba. 

Ba, who has become a role model for the country's younger generation of athletes, says Senegal has what it takes to produce talented sportspeople. 

"Lots of young people will say to themselves 'if these young people qualified, me too, I can qualify'," he told French news agency AFP.

However, he added that Senegal's road to Olympic success must also include better access to high-level competitions, of which there are few in Africa, as well as improved sports infrastructure and high-quality coaches.

Countries that invest in sports win medals, Ba said. After its success at the Youth Games, the tricky part for Senegal will be what comes next. 

Poor facilities held back Senegal's medal-free Youth Olympics team, parents say Amadou Dia Ba (left) winning his silver medal at the 1988 Seoul Olympics.

'Work to be done'

The effort seen this year, both as hosts and competitors, will have been for nothing if after the Youth Olympics young people cannot "gain access to the stadiums, lack competitions or do not have qualified coaches", Ba said. 

As it stands, "to compete in high-level competitions, one must go to Europe or the United States," Ba said, evoking his own career path. "This is a clear deficiency."

Senegal competed in its first Olympics at the Tokyo Games in 1964, sending 12 participants in athletics. Two decades later, in 1984, it debuted at the Winter Olympics in Sarajevo with a single Alpine skier.

Athletics has been Senegal's most successful event at the Games, accounting for six of its 10 all-time best results, while freestyle wrestling makes up another three and football one.

On the infrastructure side there is also work to be done, Ba says, pointing out that pole-vaulting facilities, as one example, are virtually non-existent in Senegal.

"It is the state that possesses these resources," he added. "The stadiums belong to the state. There is a minister of sport. So they're the ones to boost sports in the country."

Ba today is director of the African Athletic Development Center in Dakar, a training facility for high-level athletics.

He believes that the need to produce winning athletes and Olympians is about more than just medals, saying there is "a beauty and unique nature to the Olympic Games or being an Olympian".

"An Olympian is a point of reference for everyone in a country. People think, if they could succeed I can succeed too."

(with AFP)