Nigeria’s highest-ranked chess player and 2025 West African Champion, Abdulrahman Akintoye Abdulraheem, has urged parents, schools and corporate organisations to encourage children to start learning chess from an early age, saying it would help produce stronger players in the future.
Abdulraheem stated this at the Chess Masters 2026 competition organised by Key Academy, where he praised the growing participation of young players in the game.
Speaking in an interview with Sportxvibe.com.ng, Abdulraheem said he was excited to see many children taking part in the tournament.
“I’m excited to see this type of event. I see lots of children playing chess. Chess is a lifelong passion for me, and to see them picking up the game so young, I’m confident that very soon we’ll have players who are going to be even much better than I am,” he said.
He explained that starting early gives children a major advantage, adding that many of the achievements that took him years to accomplish could now be reached faster by young players with proper guidance.
“The things that I did in 10 years, I think these children might do them in two to three years. That’s the opportunity of starting very early,” he said.
Abdulraheem noted that when he was growing up, he did not have access to the same opportunities available to young players today, forcing him to learn through books, trial and error, and painful defeats.
“I had to gain the required chess knowledge through reading a lot of books and through trial and error. If I had a coach very early on, I would have understood important principles much faster,” he said.
The chess champion also called on corporate bodies, universities and sports associations to reward excellence in chess through sponsorships, scholarships and ambassadorial opportunities.
“The main thing is that we need to reward the people who do well. If a child performs well in this type of tournament and gets sponsorship or ambassadorship, other children will see that success is possible through chess,” he said.
According to him, rewarding merit would create healthy competition and drive better results for the sport in Nigeria.
Abdulraheem, who won the West African Championship in 2025, credited his rise to the top of Nigerian chess rankings to passion, discipline and consistent study.
“If you don’t love chess, it’s tough at the highest levels. Passion is the key. I’m always thinking about chess, always studying chess,” he said.
Comparing Nigeria with stronger chess nations, Abdulraheem said countries like Egypt currently have a deeper chess culture, but expressed confidence that Nigeria is making progress through youth-focused events.
“In the next 10 years, I guarantee you, we will also have lots of young people doing extremely well,” he said.
He added that children should begin learning chess as early as age five, once they can understand basic concepts.