Victorious sports people need real support not just ‘well done’ messages

What you need to know:

  • CS Mohamed’s congratulatory missive to Kenya Lionesses during their Olympic qualification campaign raises a Twitter storm with many saying government had no business sending such messages while failing to give support to the athletes. Where is the value in being a successful sports person or entity in Kenya?

Once many years ago, I arrived at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in a predawn flight. Day had still not fully broken when I turned into Mbagathi Way from Lang’ata Road on my way home when I saw a solitary figure jogging down the side walk from the direction of the Defence Forces Memorial Hospital.

Save for my car and the lonesome runner, the road was empty. We edged closer and closer to passing each other and I kept looking.

And there she was, illuminated by the glow of the sodium light above her. Her face was bathed in sweat and her eyes were fixed on the ground with such concentration that she was completely oblivious of the passing car. The expression on her face was one of strenuous endeavour; it spoke to something one was doing not because they were enjoying it but because it was necessary.

The runner was Catherine Ndereba.

Knowing as I did that she was a Kenya Prisons officer, I knew that she was on her way back to base on Lang’ata Road. But how far she had run at that ungodly hour, there was no telling.

World 1500m champion Timothy Cheruiyot (centre) is received by Assistant Commissioner of Prisons Catherine Ndereba (right) upon Team Kenya's arrival at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport from the World Athletics Championship in Doha, Qatar on October 7, 2019. PHOTO | CHRIS OMOLLO |

I couldn’t get that image out of my mind for the rest of my drive and it has stayed with me ever since, returning each time the subject of the earnings of superstar athletes like Eliud Kipchoge comes up.

Yet this is not a story so much about the utterly uninformed assertions that elite athletes sometimes earn more than a $1 million (about Sh100 million) in a race of a mere two hours, but the bad habit of associating yourself with success that doesn’t belong to you.

It is even worse when it is your responsibility to do everything within your power to ensure that success but you default on it and yet when victory is achieved, you want to be associated with it.

For as long as you have been reading newspapers and watching television, have you ever seen a cabinet minister visiting the training camp of athletes preparing for a marathon just to encourage them?

Have you ever seen high ranking government officials sharing an occasional meal with athletes and their families in their homes to gain insights into the kind of life they live and to hear their aspirations, fears and difficulties?

To the contrary, how many times have you heard an SOS from sports teams held hostage in a hotel until pending bills are cleared? And haven’t stories of unpaid allowances become commonplace?

Edward Zakayo (second right, Jacob Rop (centre) and Reuben Pogisho (second left) pose for photos with with Cabinet Secretary for Sports Amina Mohammed (right) and Athletics Kenya president Jackson Tuwei (left) after sweeping all the podium places in the men's Under-20 5000m at the Africa Under-20 and Under-18 Championships in Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire on April 20, 2019. PHOTOI | COURTESY |

Sports Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohammed (right) and World Marathon record holder, Eliud Kipchoge during her visit at Global Sports Communication in Kaptagat, Elgeyo-Marakwet County on September 21, 2019. PHOTO | JARED NYATAYA |

PATRIOTIC OVERTONES

Now wait until competitors overcome all these obstacles and chalk up big wins, like breaking new records or qualifying for the biggest international competitions. The first person to send a congratulatory tweet is the very person who was unavailable in their moment of distress — the cabinet secretary!

Loaded with patriotic overtones and an encouragement that wasn’t there when needed, the message is rich with sentiments of oneness and shared destiny.

I can only imagine the hardship of being on the receiving end of such a message. Does it feel like somebody is laughing at you? Where were you when my nightmare was raging, you might wonder? If, ultimately, you cannot help me, who will?

This week, I saw a Twitter storm like no other — and I was pleased. It was kicked off by Sports Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed when she congratulated the national women’s rugby team, the Kenya Lionesses, for qualifying for the semis of the Africa rugby championships in Tunisia.

She tweeted: “We celebrate @kenyalioness qualification to the semi-finals following a 36-5 win against Zimbabwe. Wishing the ladies the very best as they face Tunisia in the semi-finals this afternoon. #TwendeKazi.”

Better she had not sent it. In a swift rejoinder that kicked off the engaging conversation, one Eric Njiru wrote: “This Sports CS should be called out! These Kenya 7s babes had no money to travel to Tunisia despite government promising them. It was Nock who gave Kenya Rugby 500k meaning they now have to pay that debt. When it’s time to congratulate, she knows to curate winning tweets.”

CS Mohamed was soon buried in an avalanche of hostile rebuttals which nevertheless didn’t deter her from sending yet another congratulatory tweet when the Lionesses qualified for next year’s Olympics after their second place finish.

She tweeted: “We celebrate the outstanding performance of @kenyalioness in the just concluded @RugbyAfrique Championship. Congratulations for finishing second in the event and securing a slot in Tokyo 2020 Olympics. #TwendeKazi.”

NTV’s Idah Waringa replied: “I am tired of this. Just tired.” Mohamed’s critics were coming from somewhere and my hope is that she got the message.

Unless somebody has a personal interest, any dispassionate sports lover who has been an adult through all of Kenya’s four presidents would have no hesitation in returning the most damning verdict on the current administration.

As harnessing the gifts of youth for the benefit of society and as using the power of sport as a force for the common good goes, the future will remember this era as the past of pitch darkness. The evidence to support this assertion is everywhere on a 360-degree turn.

STADIUMS ISSUE

Moi International Sports Centre, the only stadium cleared to stage international matches has a mud bath for a pitch and its roof leaks torrents despite millions being spent on it.

Harambee Stars defender Eric Ouma (right) tussles for the ball with Mozambique's Ernesto Marcelino during their International Friendly match at a soggy Moi International Sports Centre, Kasarani in Nairobi on October 13, 2019. PHOTO | CHRIS OMOLLO |

Nyayo National, the second international stadium, has been closed for three years now. When it opens again whenever that will be, it will be immediately shut down after the first riot to allow for replacement of a massive glass facade.

Perchance, might building with glass where it is most likely to be broken have been deliberate? Maintenance is business.

Across the entire country, as Nation Sport has ably shown, colonial era stadiums are in a state of decay and many rehabilitation works, are stalled because of cost overruns and misappropriation of funds.

All this means that they cannot be used. But time does not stand still. That is why a future will arrive that will point to a past when one generation of sportsmen and women went to waste because they lacked facilities.

Meanwhile, there is an official obsession with finished products who achieved their success despite the obstacles.

Our distance athletes can still thrive without world class facilities. Not so team sportsmen and women. Budding footballers are tearing their ligaments while playing in surfaces better suited to rally cars.

I agree with CS Amina’s critics that she should go easy on her congratulatory tweets and do more visiting with athletes in their habitats. That is where all the hard work takes place.

NO FACILITIES

She will be shocked. It is a world away from the gleaming stadiums other people have but which Kenyans only enjoyed in Jubilee campaign paraphernalia.

She will then marvel at the astounding achievements of Malkia Strikers who are what they are despite their plainly primitive facilities compared to the opponents they beat or give a run for their money.

Malkia Strikers celebrate a point against Nigeria during their semi-final match at the African Games on August 28, 2019 in Rabat, Morocco. PHOTO | COURTESY |

Kenya's women volleyball team head coach Paul Bitok (right) and his assistant Japheth Munala display their African Games medals on September 2, 2019 from Rabat, Morocco at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, Nairobi. PHOTO | CHRIS OMOLLO |

Kenya national women’s volleyball team players, accompanied by head coach Paul Bitok, display their African Games gold medals upon arrival at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport from Rabat on September 2, 2019. PHOTO | CHRIS OMOLLO |

Success in sports comes the hard way. It is always the result of a life of austere discipline. It features many lonely days and nights. It means waking up before dawn and braving the elements — and risking muggings — to pound the road when the rest of us are asleep. It means pain. It means sacrifice. And thus, it deserves nothing but real support.

John Kariuki was once our national lightweight boxing champion. I featured his story of heartbreak in this column a few years ago. One day in 2006 as Kenya novices’ champion, he turned out for the national youth team in a tournament involving three countries. He defeated a Seychellois opponent at Nairobi Charter Hall to win the gold medal.

He told me: “The Kenya national anthem was played for me. You might think that was a big deal; it should be. Only the highest achievers in society merit that honour. And it takes the severest struggle to get there. But I returned to Nakuru empty-handed, except for this medal you are looking at.

“Nothing, absolutely nothing, was given to me. As I was taken to Nairobi by bus, so was I returned by the same bus with not a single penny in my pocket. I looked at my wife and I thought: ‘I can’t buy her even the cheapest bra.’

“But food was the immediate problem; I had no money for food. That is when my wife started looking for odd jobs upon realising that being champion did not mean anything except the name. To this day I don’t have a job — and I am now the national lightweight champion. Now you know why these shoes are laughing at you.”

If the national anthem can sound meaningless to a triumphant sportsman or woman, what is a congratulatory tweet?

*******
Abridged transcript of my meeting with God on the morning of last Tuesday, October 15:

God: You’re 60. This means you’re nearer the end than the beginning …

Me: Wait a minute. You’re saying I won’t make 120? I feel good enough to beat a horse in a tug-of-war, thanks to you.

God: Well, Aarhmmm …

Me: Ok, I get it. But please consider 100. In perfect health, if I may add.

God: You’ve had hits and misses. If I gave you the chance, would you like to start all over again?

Me: No. Let’s make the remaining part perfect. Make me a better person to everyone who has a stake in my life in this world. Make them good to me, too.
God: Wish granted. Leave that to me.

Me: Thank you. I want to play the full second half of my life. Also extra time. And very many minutes of stoppage time. Even penalty shoot-out I want, preferably like Ghana versus Cote d’Ivoire (1992) and Cote d’Ivoire versus Zambia (2012) in Afcon. This game is so sweet that I just don’t want it to end.

In fact …

God: Ok, ok, enough, nimesikia. (I have heard). Now go back to work.