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SuperSport has done well with regard to awarding sports personalities.
In their coverage areas, South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria lead in the provision of competitive sporting material for TV coverage.
Which is why at the end of every year DStv gives its viewers an opportunity to see how different countries award their sports personalities. Zambia, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Burundi, Ghana and Botswana are also covered by the sports channels.
None of them however holds colourful annual sports awards.
The South Africa Spots Awards gala was held on November 27, 2016. Nigeria held its a week later. In Kenya we look forward to holding ours on Tuesday December 13, 2016.
This year’s event in Kenya is not the first one. Several have been held separately for various sports disciplines. Kenya’s version is however not as elaborate as South Africa’s. We are not known for holding colourful events
Our preparations are normally shoddy and full of half measures. In any case, our organising teams are prone to shortchanging everybody and everything.
No wonder after big sporting events, the government has to commission a probe committee to look into the anomalies that take place.
Now that the December KPL Awards are scheduled, we hope the preparations are spot on. This should include the shortlisting and nomination exercise.
Already there are murmurs that the list of defenders excludes Shafik Batambuze the Tusker defender.
This reminds us of the year 2012 when Dan Sserunkuma was declared KPL Footballer Of The Year. Some fans were sceptic about the whole exercise. To some fans the award is ‘ Kenyan ‘ and should therefore not be opened to foreigners.
In 2015, the KPL awards gala was ironically hit by yet another murmur. In the eyes of many soccer fans, the midfielder of the year award should have gone to Khalid Aucho and not Eric Johanna.
Aucho actually had high hopes and he expressed the same sentiment, with disappointment that the organisers should have come clear on their bias against foreigners playing in Kenya.
We are all waiting to see how this year’s event goes. Already Batambuze’s case has drawn a lot of criticism from observers including former Harambee Stars coach Twahir Muhiddin.
Football has grown beyond borders and players are able to attract clubs from formerly unknown places like Albania, Vietnam and even Latvia.
It becomes challenging for an international player to play his heart out in a given country then watch as the local boys are feted for being better players. Doesn’ make sense.
The moment foreigners were accepted in Kenyan clubs then rules should have been adjusted to accommodate their participation in all that appertains to the game in Kenya.
That is when the game becomes competitive and interesting. KPL is not the only body that has had challenges with the selection of best players to be recognised.
The European Footballer Of The Year or Ballon d’Or awards was started in 1956. It was meant for players of European origin playing in Europe. With the movement of African players to the continent the organizers had to go back to the drawing board.
With pioneers like George Weah dazzling the pitches of Europe, rules had to be changed to accommodate non-Europeans.
In 1995, while playing for AC Milan Weah became the first non-European player to be declared European Player Of The Year. Of course some may argue that the great Mozambican Eusebio Da Silva Ferreira aka Eusebio was the first in 1965. Anyway by then Mozambique was still a Portuguese colony and Eusebio played for Benfica FC and Portuguese national team.
In 2007, Europe again revised the rules to a more accommodative World Footballer Of The Year. They now considered players from any nationality and from any club worldwide.
Football had won the war to unify the entire world. With many foreigners showing their skills and outshining our boys, maybe it is high time our judges faced the reality and selected winners on merit.
For example, after Sserunkuma won in 2012, I do not see why players like Karim Nzigiyimana, Khalid Aucho, Shafik Batambuze and maybe soon Meddie Kagere and Jacques Tuyisenge cannot be given what is due to them regardless of their nationality.
As we wait for the 2016 KPL Awards gala, we hope this year’s event will emulate what the South Africans and Nigerians did. South Africa had a very colourful event with two Masters of Ceremony — a lady and a gentleman.
The organizers did not mind giving several awards to two people, Wayde Van Niekerk and Caster Semenya. The two won many accolades because 2016 was their year of success.
I hope this year they will not repeat their annoying habit of trying to balance out the winners. They should use merit and nothing else.
Sources say that in 2015, they denied Aucho the win for Midfielder Of The Year simply because ‘ Gor Mahia players were going to sweep most awards’.
In 2016 for example, youngster Eric ‘Marcelo’ Ouma deserves to win at least two categories; Defender of the Year and Young Player Of The Year.
My bet is as follows: Most Valuable Player John Makwatta; Coach of the Year Paul Nkata; Midfielder of the Year, Humphrey Mieno; Defender of the Year, Eric Ouma; Goalkeeper of the Year, Boniface Oluoch; New Player of the Year, Eric Ouma.
