Peacemaker Azuegbulam, a native of Imo state in South-East, Nigeria, found his life again through athletics. Azuegbulam was wounded when jihadists opened fire with an anti-aircraft gun, necessitating a leg amputation.
He revealed: “After being injured, I got into a lot of things emotionally, physically, and even mentally, I was thinking a lot of things, I was not myself, it was very tough.”
He was a member of an army unit that was engaged in the effort to drive out jihadists in Nigeria’s northeast in October 2020, where the military has been waging a lengthy conflict with Islamist insurgents. Azuegbulam sustained an injury which led to a necessitated leg amputation.
Much later, he began to get involved in sports recovery for injured service members and veterans with the aid of the neighbourhood group Nigeria Unconquered, and eventually made it onto a squad going to the Invictus Games in September.
From the ashes of defeat, Azuegbulam emerged as the first Nigerian and the first African to win the top award in Invictus Games held in Dusseldorf, Germany, last month.
Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, a veteran himself, established the Invictus Games in 2014 with the goal of using sports to aid in the rehabilitation of injured service members and women.
However, weightlifting, volleyball, and table tennis have become just a few of the sports that are being competed in by 23 different countries.
27-year-old Azuegbulam competes in a variety of sports, including sitting volleyball and powerlifting, and he recently won gold in one of them. There are truly no limits except the ones we create in our minds.
