When Trump called Africa a shithole, all hell broke loose. Everyone exclaimed and baffled at how a world leader with a platform like his could utter such a statement. Most definitely, it would hurt if someone told me, “Nagudi, you are a shithole!” My human instincts would rise in defiance to the statement overpowering my rational mind. Probably, after a week of having the statement running on my mind, I would wake up to question why I was called a shithole.
I wonder if beyond the headline highlighting President Trump’s statement anyone ventured to understand its troughs and burrows. There is a lot to decipher but I will seek to speak in my area of expertise; sports. Around August, a certain National Team in Africa held a training camp for its National team in Germany. On the team, there were three naturalized players from Europe/America (first-world countries). The rationale for such a move was to ‘boost’ the squad - ‘boost’ a squad that was at a training camp!
I recently chatted with a friend over the AFCON qualifier games where Uganda lost a game to South Africa in an interesting home matchup. He suggested, “We should maybe look more into having foreign-based players and naturalizing more players from outside countries.” I couldn’t fault his thinking because that is what we as Africans have become conditioned to. The belief that we must always rely upon these developed countries to come to our aid. I bet some of us have come across the article by the Kenya Treasury Cabinet Secretary who felt embarrassed lining up at the International Monetary Fund offices like a child in line for food. According to his story, a country representative would be called and they would head to the office. The best image in my mind was the picture of Oliver Twist in tattered clothes and dry mucus running down his nose begging for extra soup from the cook in the Charles Dickens classic.
With the Confederation of Africa (CAF) Awards taking place today - Monday,16th December, the moderator for the ceremony was recently announced. I am an avid follower of African sports despite being away from home. I swiftly googled to know more about the host as her name was familiar. The first thought that came to my mind was, “Wow. Usher Komugisha must be a joke in the minds of the organizers!” Hear me out - I have no issue with seeking out expertise in an area where we have completely failed. And you can point fingers at me. After all, I left my home country to seek a better future in one of the developed countries because they have figured out most of the things that we should have figured out by now but we choose to blind our eyes to them.
The issue is we are suppressing the talent that is on the continent instead of building it and setting it up for more success. More than once, players in the league's back home have told me heartbreaking stories about exclusion from team squads at the moment of playing beyond their country’s borders. Often the teams involved import as many European or American-based players as they can afford to boost their squads. It may not be stated but it’s the politest way of telling our locally based athletes, “You cannot compete at a global or continental level!” What baffles me more is the financial aspect involved in importing these athletes is way higher than having our local players. Oftentimes, when these European or American-based players are fielded, they are paid way higher than their local counterparts. For a local player's value is often equated to taking pictures standing by the airplane, in the country's jersey, and then monetary promises that will mature depending on the club or Fédération’s mood.
The last phase of the Basketball Afrique League (BAL) qualifiers took place in Kenya and Uganda was represented by City Oil Club. It has its flaws especially when it comes to the use of foreign-based players over local-based players. But I was so amused by them fielding an 18-year-old boy, Waleed Ali Omar, who the club has groomed in an affiliate academy, iHoops Basketball Academy. That is a big win and these are wins we should be celebrating every day. It's a win because the development of our athletes has primarily been negligent of grassroots development but here is a club that is showing the whole continent how we should groom and uplift our own.
I attended the one-week Sports Business Master Class in Kigali offered by the BAL in 2022. One of the challenges the organization stated was a lack of expertise on the continent. The organization is forced to venture off the continent to attain certain services in order to execute the games. But it has also gone ahead to fill the gap of the expertise through its learning programs for the youth who often are hired by the organization or at least presented with a continuous learning experience which will be beneficial in the future.
Imagine the expenses African federations/clubs/confederations spent in hiring foreign coaches or temporarily boosting their team squads was spent on establishing better sports academies or providing a study opportunity for the local coaches to obtain sports certifications required for those roles. Imagine those expenses were channeled into building better sports facilities where we can equip our athletes to also compete at global levels.
Besides Usher Komugisha, there is a long lineup of other African women sports journalists - Juliet Bawuah, Jackie Lumbasi, among others - who could have been hosts for the CAF awards. I don’t discredit the announced CAF host as she is great at sports communication and football fans around the world marvel at her prowess in this male-dominated field but when shall Africa get to showcase and build a Kate Scott?
If I discovered oil on my land, I wouldn't hide it and say, “I will extract and produce this oil by myself.” Instead I will write to Tullow Oil, Exxon, and Saudi Aramco (name any international Oil Company) and call them to support me with their expertise and experience. In the meantime, I will ensure that once the expertise is on ground we look for ways to educate the locals within my community so that tomorrow once the International Company has parted ways, we will be able to carry on the extraction and production of the oil.
I will not re-air the president’s statement but it is high time we set our priorities right.
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