Kenyan football in need of deep reform

NAIROBI – Sweeping reforms are needed to revive the flagging fortunes of Kenyan football which is mired in internal disputes, corruption and allegations of match fixing, some of the country’s top sporting figures claim.

Since 1964, the Kenya Football Federation (KFF) have used the sport as a springboard into power politics, a phenomenon that has crippled the board, ruined the game and alienated hundreds of thousands of fans, they say. “People have come to football not for the love of it but with vested interests,” said legendary Kenyan striker Joe Kadenge, whose dazzling exploits in the 1950s and 60s boosted Kenya’s international football reputation.”It is no longer an honour to be elected to head the national office,” he told AFP.”There’s no commitment from the administrators, no existing facilities or even pitches for youth development.”In its heyday, in the 1980s Kenyan football enjoyed tremendous success with the Harambee Stars winning the East and Central Africa Senior Challenge Cup a record three-times in a row.But the national side foundered amid boardroom battles in the 1990s, culminating in the 2004 government intervention which drew a sharp rebuke from Fifa.World football’s governing body forbids state meddling in the sport, and banned Kenya from international play for three months.Its recent problems have included losing seasons, deadly fan violence, physical attacks on rival KFF officials, a match-fixing allegation and stern Fifa warnings to get its house in order.Sports lecturer and former middle-distance track star Mike Boit, who chaired a transitional governing body after the KFF board was dissolved by the government last year, compares Kenyan football with a broken down lorry.”The first thing one does is to identify the mechanical problems,” said Boit, citing findings of a report his committee prepared last year on reasons behind Kenya’s faltering football fortunes.”But if instead of changing the faulty parts, you only remove the driver, you will not have sorted out the root problem,” he added, noting that the KFF had been plagued by revolving leadership and a series of 12 KFF chiefs all but one of whom have entered politics.In addition to mismanagement, Boit’s report found that the KFF and Kenya in general had refused to embrace professionalism in defiance of global trends.”We have approached football as an amateur sport,” he said.”We prefer the good old days when people would assemble a team and win the Gossage Cup,” he said of the colonial-era football tournament that ran from 1926 to 1945 involving Kenya, Uganda, Tanganyika and Zanzibar.In addition to outdated priorities, corruption allegations have further contributed to the KFF’s woes, disgusting avid local football supporters who have boycotted Kenyan fixtures in favor of European and South American leagues.The most serious involve the misuse of funds from Fifa and Confederation of African Football that were intended to boost development of youth soccer in the east African nation.Three officials, including immediate former KFF chairman Maina Kariuki are currently on trial on charges of stealing more than 55 million Kenyan shillings (725,000 dollars) belonging to the cash-strapped federation.And, due to gross KFF mismanagement, several top Kenyan league clubs have been forced to disband altogether as their owners were unable to meet the financial burden of keeping them afloat.Officials with several top teams, concerned after eight clubs folded in the past three years, opted out of the KFF in 2004 and formed a limited partnership company modelled on similar ventures in Britain and South Africa.The government strongly opposed the formation of Kenya Premier League Ltd on the grounds that the national federation is the only body with jurisdiction over the sport, but club officials said creating the company was the only way to keep football alive in the country.”The clubs will benefit with the money going from the company to the clubs and not from the clubs to the company as has been the case with the KFF,” said Bob Munro, a Canadian who spearheaded the drive to create the company.”The sport should be in the hands of coaches, managers and referees and not of people with different interests other than football,” said Munro, who founded the Mathare Youth Sports Association in Nairobi a decade ago for slum children.-Nampa-AFP”People have come to football not for the love of it but with vested interests,” said legendary Kenyan striker Joe Kadenge, whose dazzling exploits in the 1950s and 60s boosted Kenya’s international football reputation.”It is no longer an honour to be elected to head the national office,” he told AFP.”There’s no commitment from the administrators, no existing facilities or even pitches for youth development.”In its heyday, in the 1980s Kenyan football enjoyed tremendous success with the Harambee Stars winning the East and Central Africa Senior Challenge Cup a record three-times in a row.But the national side foundered amid boardroom battles in the 1990s, culminating in the 2004 government intervention which drew a sharp rebuke from Fifa.World football’s governing body forbids state meddling in the sport, and banned Kenya from international play for three months.Its recent problems have included losing seasons, deadly fan violence, physical attacks on rival KFF officials, a match-fixing allegation and stern Fifa warnings to get its house in order.Sports lecturer and former middle-distance track star Mike Boit, who chaired a transitional governing body after the KFF board was dissolved by the government last year, compares Kenyan football with a broken down lorry.”The first thing one does is to identify the mechanical problems,” said Boit, citing findings of a report his committee prepared last year on reasons behind Kenya’s faltering football fortunes.”But if instead of changing the faulty parts, you only remove the driver, you will not have sorted out the root problem,” he added, noting that the KFF had been plagued by revolving leadership and a series of 12 KFF chiefs all but one of whom have entered politics.In addition to mismanagement, Boit’s report found that the KFF and Kenya in general had refused to embrace professionalism in defiance of global trends.”We have approached football as an amateur sport,” he said.”We prefer the good old days when people would assemble a team and win the Gossage Cup,” he said of the colonial-era football tournament that ran from 1926 to 1945 involving Kenya, Uganda, Tanganyika and Zanzibar.In addition to outdated priorities, corruption allegations have further contributed to the KFF’s woes, disgusting avid local football supporters who have boycotted Kenyan fixtures in favor of European and South American leagues.The most serious involve the misuse of funds from Fifa and Confederation of African Football that were intended to boost development of youth soccer in the east African nation.Three officials, including immediate former KFF chairman Maina Kariuki are currently on trial on charges of stealing more than 55 million Kenyan shillings (725,000 dollars) belonging to the cash-strapped federation.And, due to gross KFF mismanagement, several top Kenyan league clubs have been forced to disband altogether as their owners were unable to meet the financial burden of keeping them afloat.Officials with several top teams, concerned after eight clubs folded in the past three years, opted out of the KFF in 2004 and formed a limited partnership company modelled on similar ventures in Britain and South Africa.The government strongly opposed the formation of Kenya Premier League Ltd on the grounds that the national federation is the only body with jurisdiction over the sport, but club officials said creating the company was the only way to keep football alive in the country.”The clubs will benefit with the money going from the company to the clubs and not from the clubs to the company as has been the case with the KFF,” said Bob Munro, a Canadian who spearheaded the drive to create the company.”The sport should be in the hands of coaches, managers and referees and not of people with
different interests other than football,” said Munro, who founded the Mathare Youth Sports Association in Nairobi a decade ago for slum children.-Nampa-AFP