Team Nigeria ended its Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games campaign on Saturday morning at the Tokyo Olympic Stadium, raking in one more gold and a bronze medal to finish with four gold, one silver and five bronze medals.
Lauritta Onye started the closing day of Nigeria’s contest by winning bronze in the women F40 shot put event and Flora Ugunnwa brought icing on the cake with gold in the F54 javelin event.
Lauritta who competed under very difficult conditions on the wet and slippery grounds of the stadium threw 8.29 metres, not enough to rattle gold medalist Sliwinska Renata of Poland whose 8.75 metres cancelled off Lauritta’s games record of 8.40m set in Rio 2016, and Djelal Salem of Algeria secured the silver with 8.33 metres.
Flora Ugunnwa turned the story around in the F54 javelin finals, Nigeria’s last event, dusting her opponents with 18.39 metres throw to leave Kurbanova Nurkorn of Uzbekistan and Yang Liwan of China in the second and third positions.
Flora says she planned to achieve more at the Paralympic Games but remains thankful to God for the gold medal.
“My aim was to break my own record and set a new one. We had good training during our camping, thanks to the Minister of Sports (Sunday Dare) who ensured that the conditions were conducive, but the situation changed somewhat as we got into Japan. I had a little bit of difficulty with the time zone and weather, and I also became ill. All the same, I kept on and I thank God I ended with the gold.
“I dedicate it first to God who has been my strength and then to my husband and children, to my coach, Patrick Anaeto, as well as to coach Ade who has been very helpful through this period.”
With the two laurels, Nigeria finished Tokyo Paralympics with 10 medals from three events. Powerlifting accounted for six — three gold, one silver and two bronze. Athletics brought the second-largest haul — one gold and two bronze; while table tennis added just a bronze medal.
The overall medal haul is just two short of Nigeria’s record set in Rio 2016 where the country made the podium 12 times.
