Thandizani Newspaper Yanu
Malawi sports directors a big, big disappointment!
OPINION
Joe Chibewa is hot under the collar because of how sports is managed in Malawi
MZUZU--If a competition were to be organised today to find the least organised nation when it comes to sporting activities, Malawi is certain to score highly in that field if recent trends are a pointer.
Just this week, Athletics Association of Malawi (AAM) failed to send a team of three athletes to the African Senior Championship which started in Kenya on Wednesday. Instead, it only managed to secure funding for only one athlete, Chancy Master, who left just hours before the start of the competition. Reason? Lack of funds.
Initially, the AAM had planned to send three athletes to the Kenya meet namely Master, Elizabeth Tengatenga and Felix Mhango at an estimated cost of K400,000 but failed to raise that much at the eleventh hour, citing lack of resources.
You can imagine just how disappointed the dropped athletes may have felt to be told last minute, with their bags packed, that they are not making the trip!
The picked athlete himself sounded so pessimistic about his envisaged performance in the championship for lack of proper preparation. Said Master in an interview published Tuesday: “I have been training in Mulanje alone but that is not the best of preparations [for] a competition of such magnitude.”
Two months ago, a team of Malawian athletes and sports officials went to Kenya for the same African Senior Championship. They made news for arriving for the games two months earlier! As expected, the team came back home, not as heroes but clowns.
Just where did they get the communication that the games were on? Tongue-in-cheek, all the AAM could say as a reason for clowning in Kenya was “there was a communication breakdown”. What impudence!
And not so long ago, South Africa toppled Malawi from the top rank as Africa’s best netball team, according to the latest world and continental netball rankings. The Queens, as they are fondly called, also slipped to the 7th position on the world rankings from 5th.
The drop in ranking was a direct result of the Queens inactivity on the international scene attributed to the sports ministry for not allowing the national netball team to take part in a world netball governing body International Federation of Netball Associations (Ifna) sanctioned test series against South Africa in April.
According to media reports, South Africa invited Malawi to play the test series to improve their ranking on the world and continental stages in readiness for the October 2010 Commonwealth Games in New Delhi, India.
The Netball Association of Malawi (Nam) received an invitation for the South Africa tournament in January and confirmed participation and the Netball South Africa (NSA) sent air tickets and booked accommodation for the Queens and internal transport only to turn down the offer at the eleventh hour.
Reason? The Malawi government, through its sports ministry, didn’t want South Africa to improve their rankings via the Queens. Malawi woyee! That’s what we call sportsmanship.
And in the latest episode, one that can be seen as a clear testimony of procrastination and lack of seriousness, we hear of nine Malawi Under-23 national team players missing their scheduled flight on Monday afternoon for a mini international soccer tournament in Egypt.
It is said they jumped onto a slow coach from Blantyre to Lilongwe in the morning and only reached Kamuzu International Airport around noon when the plane they were supposed to catch was already taxiing off!
Why they couldn’t leave a day earlier to ensure that they have enough time to check in at the airport to avoid last minute hiccups such as they encountered, nobody seems to have any plausible answers except to say that wasn’t foreseen. My foot! Administrators who can’t foresee the unforeseeable!
And as if that were not enough, the Junior Flames fielded only 10 players in their opening game against Morocco on Tuesday evening because they couldn’t raise a full side! That was another classic, probably a first in the history of international soccer.
Inevitably, the Junior Flames were buried 1-0 albeit fighting to the end. Yes, the lads put up a gallant fight, but you don’t win matches when you go into battle ill-prepared like the Flames were.
The question that lingers is: What’s wrong with our sports administrators?
Indeed, this is the question most of our sports administrators love to hate when it is posed to them because it exposes them and all can see what they really are: a bunch of um, um, um, I can’t just find the right word, please help me out here!
They are people who lack accountability to say the least and oftentimes parsimonious. Yes, they are excessively frugal to the detriment of sports.
The truth is that money or funding is not the big issue in running sports in this country. The big issue or the problem, for lack of a better word, is the administrators themselves don’t seem to know why they are there at all, if not just to enrich themselves!
We need serious people in all sports if Malawi wants to be counted and stop being a laughingstock. And mind you, this is no laughing matter!--maravipost
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