Amobi Okoye, defensive tackle with the Houston Texans of the National Football League, started a project with other athletes called the Athletes in the Diaspora Community Interventions (ADCI) which provides humanitarian support for change on the African continent.
For one of the projects, Changing Africa Through Education (CATE), Amobi traveled to Nigeria with several other professional athletes (Adewale Ogunleye, Israel Idonije (Chicago Bears), Osi Umenyiora (New York Giants), and Ahman Green (Houston Texans), to work on programs that included scholarship endowments, soccer camps, and, clean water programs and they held five mobile clinics for over 1,000 residents. In addition, medicine was distributed in partnership with physicians from Integris Health of Oklahoma. The players held two physical activity camps which exposed youth to the fundamentals of American Football and they included girls as a part of their commitment to the advancement of women in sports. During the trip, Okoye and ADCI launched the ADCI Academy of Sports and Learning which will be built in Nigeria. ADCI is presented in conjunction with the Sports and Marketing Management firm founded by Okoye, InVictus91. Additional programs that Amobi Okoye leads through C.A.T.E and the Amobi Okoye Foundation include the funding of clean water wells and the ongoing sponsorship of a maternity ward, the only hospital within 100 mile radius in Nri, a developing village in Nigeria. Other athletes who donated but were unable to make the trip include Nnamdi Asomuga and Adimchinobe Echemandu (Oakland Raiders), Kabeer Gbaja-Biamila (Green Bay Packers), Akbar Gbaja-Biamila (Miami Dolphins).
Amobi Okoye was born in Anambra, Nigeria. He moved to Huntsville, Alabama when he was 12 years old. After only spending two weeks in middle school, he tested into the 9th grade. He first started playing football as a sophomore at Lee High School, knowing virtually nothing about the game before his high school coach suggested he go play Madden NFL football to learn. By the time he was a senior, he won first-team All-State honors as both a defensive and offensive lineman. At the age of 16, Amobi Okoye became the youngest NCAA student athlete of all time. Amobi successfully graduated from Louisville within 3 ½ years, prior to entering the NFL as the youngest athlete ever drafted into the NFL in the modern draft era. Okoye was drafted by the Houston Texans as the tenth pick of the first round of the 2007 NFL draft.
The Amobi Okoye Foundation was founded on the belief that all youth have the basic human right of hope for a brighter future. Programs and services have been implemented domestically and abroad that address the basic needs of children and their surrounding communities.
These programs include: Kick-off for Kids, Tackle Hunger, Amobi’s House, C.A.T.E (Changing Africa Through Education) and AO’s Young Professionals.
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