Bailing Out Collapsing Social Infrastructure in Developing Countries Through Sports: How Football is Contributing to Healthcare Improvement in Urban Nigeria

Abstract

Although the role of sports in shaping/changing urban and regional landscapes through megalomaniac building of stadia, golf courses, among other spectacular artifacts have recently attracted tremendous academic research interests, sports' role in improving collapsing health-care infrastructure in developing countries is poorly documented. Here, we show the potentials of football in multi-stakeholder mobilization for financing/improving/ in urban health-care Nigeria using contributions towards heart diseases treatment by Kanu Heart Foundation and campaigns by Nigeria's international footballers. Geo-demographic analysis of secondary data is applied to highlight inadequacy of healthcare in urban Cross River State, like of urban (like rural) Nigeria. How various diplomacy concepts could be employed by urban managements to mobilize sports-heroes, stakeholders (professionals: players, managers, clubs; civil society, etc) for fund-raising towards improving healthcare in Nigeria is described. The policy implication of this paper includes employing multi-dimensional diplomacy for managing multi-stakeholder urban sports and health development programmes as a means of surmounting the problem of inadequate funding for urban health development in Cross River State, Nigeria. Although this article focuses on Nigeria, its description of health-care deficits and findings speak for much of sub-Saharan Africa and developing countries.