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Editor’s note
The most certain thing one can say about sports is that it unites people from different backgrounds, cultures, languages. Have you ever watched football club fans at a sports bar during a match with their favourite team? The instant camaraderie that springs up once you are aligned with somebody on the same sports team can be compared only to love at first sight.
I wouldn’t really say I am a lover of sports. I grew up as
an athlete. Ran 100 and 200m races at school; I loved to jog long distances for the fun of it and then fell in love with Michael Jordan (which young girl who grew up in the 80s didn’t?) and the game of basketball. I had a little spell there where I knew everything about Manchester United and now I am just an avid spectator of African matches, especially those where Nigeria is playing.
In this edition of the Lion King Magazine, we focus on the changing narrative in Africa where UBA is playing a signif- icant role (Changing the African Narrative, page 11). The narrative is aided along through the things that unite us as a people and that is sports, most especially football. In (A New Kind of Gold, page 8), we remind ourselves of the tal- ent we have in Africa as we showcase some of our best.
We all love winners and to associate with winning teams. It is why we are very happy to claim Anthony Joshua
(How Could AJ Lose? Page 30) as one of us and took it personally when he got beaten by Ruiz. It is the reason we celebrated Masai Ujiri when he led the Toronto Raptors
to the team’s first ever NBA Championship win this year. I witnessed first-hand, the Hockey loving Canadian city of Montreal, shut down to watch the Toronto raptors play as Canada honoured this Nigerian sports hero.
Our women are not being left behind. The Nigerian National women’s football team won the first seven African Championships, and, in their first twenty years as a team, have lost only five games to African competition. Asisat Oshoala’s story is one that makes us proud of our Africa (The Girl Who Dared to Dream page 14).
There are so many fun articles in this edition. Write to us and tell us what you liked most and what you really didn’t like much.
Bola Atta
Editor-in-Chief
Follow us @UBAGroup
www.ubagroup.com
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