Let’s engage in aggressive sports talent development
What you need to know:
The issue: Talent development.
Our view: If in the Budget that Parliament passed this week a significant sum had been put aside to help set up sports academies, identify talent and develop it, the benefits to this country would be immense in the near future.
At the launch of the Alliance for National Transformation party this week, Maj Gen Mugisha Muntu raised an important point. He spoke about bolstering the spirit of Ugandans, especially young Ugandans, and assured them that they can rise and be of significance not just in Uganda but in the whole world.
In his speech, Gen Muntu dwelt heavily on the development of science and technology, including ICT, to spur transformation. All the examples of prosperous personalities around the world who he cited have built multi-billion dollar companies from scratch using ICT. It is important for Ugandan children to grow up aspiring to become the next Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates.
What Gen Muntu forgot to cite, however, is the potential that is in sports. Take the example of the story of Sadio Mane from Senegal. For the uninitiated, Mane is an attacker who plays for Liverpool Football Club. He was a joint top scorer in the English Premiership this term, tying at 22 goals apiece with two other Africans – Arsenal’s Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Egypt’s Mohamed Salah.
Telling his story to British press a month ago, Mane said that at 15, he made the near 500-mile journey north to Dakar, the capital of Senegal, for the trials that paved his way to Europe. A picture of a young Mane wearing torn boots was released in the stories. He now plays in the most publicised football league in the world, and earns millions of dollars per year in wages.
Neighbouring Kenya has Vincent Wanyama plying his trade in London-based Tottenham Hotspur, and will, together with Mane, contest the European Champions League final.
If Wanyama and Mane can do it, Ugandan boys too can. Many will acknowledge that we are a country with immense football talent. We have produced too many top players in the past for this to be disputed. The problem, however, is that most players won’t have been developed from an early age, and will be discovered too late. This is true with football as it is true with athletics and other sports.
If in the Budget that Parliament passed this week a significant sum had been put aside to help set up sports academies, identify talent and develop it, the benefits to this country would be immense in the near future.
This is one transformative idea that the government may take up and implement to help Ugandans to dream. It is not too late.
