USA - Tallest NBA player ever stumps for harvesting potential of Africa

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A conference at Ohio University over the weekend drew a remarkable guest: a legendary NBA player and one of the tallest people in the world.

Manute Bol, the 7 foot-7 former NBA celebrated shot-blocker, was keynote speaker in the fourth annual Sports in Africa Conference at Walter Hall on Friday.

It was a scene to behold as conference participants jostled for the rare opportunity to pose for pictures with the renowned athlete, whose NBA career saw him play for teams such as the Washington Bullets (now Washington Wizards), Golden State Warriors, Philadelphia 76ers and Miami Heat.

Bol's story of success is stuff that fairly tales are made of. Bol had not touched basketball until he was 18. In his home village in southern Sudan where he tended his father's cattle, there were no basketball courts; he had only known soccer. On a visit to one of his cousins in the city of Wau in Sudan, he was introduced to basketball, which he reluctantly decided to try. When he decided to try dunking, he lost a tooth, which was caught on the net.

On that fateful day, he resolved not to lose a tooth in vain and decided to make basketball his game. A few months later, he had become so good that he was recruited to join the Sudanese national team. Here is where an American coach noticed him and invited him to come to the United States to play college basketball. He arrived in the U.S. in 1983, and two years later joined the NBA, where he would play for 10 seasons. The Sudanese boy who had never set foot in a class was finally a superstar.

His story was inspiring to many conference participants, especially those from Africa.

Kwabena Owusu-Kwarteng, a senior in business economics from Ghana, said Bol's story showed that there was "a lot of potential in Africa; we just need to harness it."

The conference, jointly organized by the Institute for the African Child, the Center for Sports Administration, the School of Health Sciences and the School of Recreation and Sport Sciences at OU, drew participants from Africa and the United States to deliberate on how health issues can be addressed through sports, explained Gerard Akindes, one of the conference coordinators.

The conference's focus was a neat fit for Bol, who has been actively involved in sports status and money to help improve the plight of his people in Sudan. Bol is founder of the Ring True Foundation - an organization dedicated to helping fight against diseases such as malaria and HIV/AIDS in Africa.

Lately, Bol has been in the forefront of calling to end the Darfur Crisis. In his keynote address on Friday, Bol told conference attendees that as a global power, America has clear leverage to end the war in Darfur. The world intervened in Bosnia, Afghanistan, Iraq and Lebanon. Why not Darfur, he wondered? He urged Americans to write letters to their representatives, urging the U.S. government to help end the genocide in Darfur.

This trend of using sports and sportsmanship to provide an antidote to many problems in Africa was emphasized in the conference. Diane Ciekawy, an associate professor of anthropology at OU and a facilitator for the conference, said that conducting sports programs provides a gateway to communication. "Like music, sports can break many barriers between people and can serve as a framework for development," she said.

Ciekawy said that many people in the conference presented research on improving health in Africa, especially in children, using sports.

The African events over the weekend were rounded off by an African Hero's dinner at Baker Center Ballroom on Saturday night. African music, dance, poetry and a fashion show marked the event. Multiple African dishes were served.

Ebenezer Malcalm, treasurer of the African Students Union at OU, said that event honors important personalities in Africa and the Diaspora for their efforts to help promote development in Africa.

George Ayittey, a distinguished economist at the American University in Washington, D.C., was crowned the African hero for the annual event. Malcalm said that Ayittey was chosen as an African hero because of his unwavering criticism of the African leaders who have failed the continent.

Ayittey said the recognition by the African Students Union meant that a particular viewpoint of self-criticism is permeating into the young generation in Africa.

He said that the honor would not be his alone but also for those unsung heroes in Africa who have suffered under oppressive governments. "Government officials in Africa do not like my message, but people on the ground do," Ayittey said.

"The solutions to many of our problems can be found in us and not in the corridors of the World Bank," he declared.