We hold this truth to be self-evident: That more often than should be, Nigerian athletes, and by extension, African sports persons, are subjected to undeserved scrutiny. This ultimately translates into micro and macro aggressions and outright witch hunts with no basis in factual accuracy. It’s not always immediately obvious. But these detractors bask in the full glare of the public, surreptitiously shielded by institutionalised unbelief in the severity of compatriots’ concerns. And sometimes, time is all we can hold on to in proving that our concerns about their scrutiny are as valid now as before.
On 25 May 2026, a clip from CITIUS Mag’s Podcast featuring former American middle-distance runner and 1,500m specialist, Kyle Merber, caused a stir on X. In the clip, Merber spoke about the need for a collective apology to Tobi Amusan for the unfair criticism she faced following her world record 12.12 seconds 100m hurdles race at the semi-finals of the 2022 World Athletics Championship in Eugene, Oregon. According to him, many sports enthusiasts are now beginning to see the validity of the record simply because an American athlete is close to breaking it. USA athlete Masai Russell ran the second fastest ever time of 12.14 seconds at the 23 May 2026 Xiamen Diamond League, ahead of Amusan in 2nd place. Whereas when Amusan broke the record, there were allegations of faulty recording equipment, her running spikes giving her an advantage, and quite distastefully, doping.
At the 2022 Eugene meet, she actually broke the record twice, running a blistering 12.06 seconds on her way to a first world title. However, the time was discounted due to the tailwind. The gold medal—Nigeria’s first at the World Athletics Championships—was more than enough consolation, a cherry on top of a $100,000 prize for upsetting the 6-year record. No sooner had the celebrations begun before criticism rained in from various quarters.
Legendary American sprinter and 4-time Olympic gold medallist Michael Johnson was initially the most vocal of the lot. In a now infamous tweet, he stated, “I don’t believe 100h times are correct. World record broken by .08! 12 PBs set. 5 National records set. And Cindy Sember quote after her PB/NR ‘I thought I was running slow!’ All athletes looked shocked.” Following backlash, mostly from Nigerians, he doubled down on his doubts, questioning the time system. Johnson was a commentator for the BBC at the event, which meant that his statements carried considerable weight as both a respected sportsman and as a member of the media. It didn’t seem to matter that an American athlete had broken the 400m hurdles world record at the same event in an equally astonishing time (the first female sub-51 seconds time ever).
The spikes theory took flight about the same time as Michael Johnson’s comments. Irish sports journalist Cathal Dennehy attributed the win to Amusan’s spikes, the Adidas Adizero Avanti, despite the lack of substantive data showing that Avanti spikes caused major differences in ground contact time and stride length. When he supposedly asked her whether the spikes played a role in her victory, Amusan responded by saying, “My abilities are not centred around spikes.”
With these accusations, the seeds for the third batch of accusations, this time about doping, were already being planted. Comments hinting at the use of banned enhancers dominated posts doubting her record. When the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) charged and provisionally suspended Amusan on 19 July, 2023, for 3 whereabouts failures (Filing Failure and/or Missed Test within a period of 12 months), certain commentators felt vindicated in their suspicion. Dennehy referred to his 2022 interview with the hurdles star, alongside an infamous 2008 letter from Victor Conte, founder of the indicted nutritional company. Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (BALCO) about British sprinter Dwain Chambers’ doping regimen program, which involved deliberately missed tests. Amusan’s suspension was like an answer to the prayers of the mob. Salvation from the unbelieving horde of Nigerian fans and journalists whom Dennehy termed “fans with smartphones.” There was a noticeable Western media majority insisting that this verdict was right up until the World Athletics Disciplinary Tribunal gave its verdict a month later on 17 August 2023: No, Amusan was not guilty.
Undeterred, the witch hunt continued. As more people spoke up in support of Amusan, media inquiries increased. Given the previous history of Nigerian athletes being banned from doping, and Amusan’s stratospheric rise on the world stage, it was understandable that the public had so much of a stake in the matter. Journalists pushing out multiple stories wasn’t the issue. The issue was that coverage was just shy of labelling her guilty. Objectivity took the backseat. And in attempting to call out colleagues who had opted for an overtly positive lens—wrongfully, one must add—Dennehy and others instead completely devalued the opinions of Nigerian journalists completely.
Amusan herself reprimanded Dennehy after Heat 5 of the World Athletics Championship in Budapest on 22 August 2023. “I’m talking about my fans, and you’re talking about charges. What charges?” she said in response to his question about the AIU charge before continuing, “Mr. Cathal [Dennehy], I am not going to answer your question. You’ve asked the same question five times now and I’m not answering it. Ridiculous.” In response, Dennehy penned a rather venomous Irish Independent piece titled “Amusan can’t hurdle the hard questions forever,” complete with the Angry Black woman trope. It was so bad that Deji Ogeyingbo, Country Manager of front-burner athletics aggregator page, Making of Champions, had to call out Dennehy for his ungainly coverage. Not that this changed anything in his approach, or that of others, bolstered by the AIU eventually filing an appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) on 15 September, 2023.
On 28 June 2024, the CAS dismissed the appeal and certified Amusan not guilty of whereabouts failure. Unsurprisingly, her loudest detractors didn’t think to follow through accordingly. Silence became the alternative to accountability. It’s been almost two years, and not even the slightest retraction of those claims have been made. No apologies. Just an overwhelming silence from self-appointed gatekeepers of Athletics who still defend their actions on social media.
There’s a moment in this whole sequence of events that best describes Amusan’s treatment. On 17 September 2023, just two days after the AIU filed its appeal, the Nigerian hurdler competed at the 2023 Eugene Diamond League. She was chasing her third 100m hurdles title in 3 years on her return to the track where she set the new world record. In a 25-second official commentary clip of the race, there’s an astonishing omission of Amusan’s name from takeoff right until the race’s conclusion. At the 5-second mark, when she clearly pulls into the lead, the commentator instead calls Puerto Rico’s Camacho-Quinn Jasmine and the USA’s Kendra Harrisson. A few seconds later, he calls Jamaica’s Danielle Williams ‘in the lead’, which is frankly wrong. Even at the end when he mentions that “they’re not going to catch her this time” as the camera pans to a victorious Amusan, he doesn’t mention her name. He calls out the winning time, again, not her name.
It’s such an easily overlooked detail when one watches the clip. But it speaks volumes about the subtle, perhaps unconscious treatment of the star. Nigerian sports journalist Christopher Maduewesi, a vocal proponent during the allegations saga and one of the journalists Dennehy referenced in that Irish Independent report, pointed out how this omission was problematic. In response, some claimed that it could have been a mistake by the commentator or deliberate action to avoid mispronouncing her name. Ignoring the absurdity of the latter excuse, the fact that the commentator could make such a glaring mistake with the top rated 100m hurdler in the world speaks volumes of their perception of Amusan. Additional excuses that her name was on-screen and probably mentioned in the post-race interview do not also fly. Once all this context comes to the fore, it’s hard to look past this moment as a potential reflection of certain media practitioners’ views on the matter.
Three years later, some insist that Nigerians need to move on. If that script sounds familiar, it’s because time and again, subsets of Western media and their consumers treat African sports persons with micro and macro aggressions. And when the die is cast, they follow up with calls for forgiveness—that’s if they even consider their actions to be transgressive in the first place. Some of these portrayals are so couched in seemingly well-intentioned comments that you don’t realise the harm being done. For years, Senegalese footballer Sadio Mane has been represented as a down-to-earth superstar who couldn’t care less about wealth compared to some other African and Black European superstars. As beautiful as that seems, there’s a tinge of racism involved, confining him to an image of a man who knows his place. When Mane’s wage issues with Liverpool occurred, the media, in attempting to support him, reduced him to a two-dimensional ‘delectable Negroe’ persona. Call it the Kante treatment.
Another example is how clips from Mikel Obi’s podcast, Obi One, have been crafted into memes. The running joke is around his ‘faux’ British accent. Beneath this humour, there’s a layer of indignation most people haven’t realised, in that Obi’s takes are invariably considered less substantial compared to colleagues doing similar work. His commentary is belittled subconsciously in the name of comedic relief. When, someday, an outwardly racist football fan or commentator utilises this in their criticism, Nigerians will come to his defense. But in this case, we would have laid the foundation ourselves. It’s one thing to criticise a star for co-opting a foreign accent to the extent of mispronouncing Nigerian names. It’s another to ridicule their work, as a result. Foreign social media users do not have this distinction for the most part.
Now more than ever, Nigerian and African sports media have to be intentional about narratives. Telling our stories with the depth of care and expertise required isn’t too much to ask. Critiquing superstars with an objective lens while still aware of underlying tensions is a non-negotiable task. It’s rough out there in the discourse trenches. A festival of every countryman and woman for themselves. Selective outrage isn’t even disguised anymore (Individuals citing previous history of doping among Nigerian athletes ignored the same from their USA counterparts). And so, when athletes like Amusan aren’t protected from this uninformed deluge of venom, the consequences are very much dire. It’s bad enough that the Government isn’t as supportive of our stars as it should be. Failing to refute harmful claims or call out bigoted subtext would be accepting defeat even before the whistle’s blown.
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