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Athletics Federation of Nigeria’s (AFN) acting president, Olamide George, said the death of another veteran athletics coach, John Obeya, has devastated the athletics community in Nigeria.
Coach Obeya died Tuesday in Jos, Plateau State, after complaining of stomachache. He was aged 65.
“This is a very sad day for track and field in Nigeria. When we are still mourning the untimely passing of coach Tobias Igwe, another blow has been dealt our dear sport with the report of coach Obeya’s death in Jos,” said George in a statement.
George lamented that Nigeria has lost one of her most talented track and field coaches.
Until his death, Obeya was a sprints coach with the Bahrain Athletics Association and was instrumental to the recruitment of reigning world 400metres champions, Salwa Eid Naser (formerly Ebelechukwu Agbapuonwu), by Bahrain, in 2014.
He trained Eid Naser to win the 400metres gold at the 2015 World Youth Championships in Athletics in Cali, Colombia, and silver at the 2017 IAAF World Championships in London.
Although Eid Naser struck gold at the 2019 IAAF World Championships in Doha, Qatar, under another coach, Dominican Jose Ludwig Rubio, it was Obeya that laid the foundation for her incredible feats in the women’s quarter-mile, where she ran 48.14 seconds, the third fastest time of all time behind (East) Germany’s Marita Koch (47.60 seconds in 1985) and Czech’s Jarmila Kratochvilova (47.99 in 1983).
