City Park is the only world-class hockey stadium in Kenya

By Oscar PILIPILI

Located strategically in the heart of Nairobi, City Park Hockey Stadium is the only one of its kind in East Africa.

It was built on countdown to the fourth All Africa Games held in Nairobi in 1987. Its edel grass turf was manufactured in the Netherlands with the latest technology in hockey pitches.

The stadium is the only world-class facility in the country but overuse and neglect led to its ruin and closure in October 2003. Former Sports Minister Maina Kamanda and current Kenya Hockey Union (KHU) chairman Resham Bains combined forces to renovate the pitch.

Former glory

The renovation works that ended in 2007 returned City Park Stadium to its former glory and returned international hockey to Kenya.

Garbage at the parking area of the sports facility.

Countries that has blacklisted Kenya like Pakistan, Egypt and South Africa due to lack of a standard facility returned to Kenya after laying of the turf.

But all these efforts might be in futility if the KHU does not move fast to upgrade all areas of the Stadium. The state-of-the-art pitch and automatic water sprinklers are the only things that give the stadium that is located in the upmarket Nairobi suburb of Parklands a modern look. If I borrow the words of a Nigerian player, things outside make the facility to look like ‘a village stadium.’

The parking area becomes muddy and waterlogged when it rains as garbage from the neighbouring hawkers market spill over to the stadium’s land. Bains said they are working together with Olympic Solidarity through National Olympic Committee of Kenya (Nock) and other partners to upgrade the entire stadium.

The areas of great concern include borehole, floodlights and all-weather parking.

"Motorways Constructions Limited has already done survey work on the parking," says Bains.

The chairman revealed Nock has asked the KHU to come up with a proposal on floodlights project that will be funded by the Olympic Solidarity.

"Once we put the floodlights in place, the stadium will be able to host activities at night," he says.

The stadium can, without floodlights, host a maximum of five matches per day and between seven and eight matches with the lights in place.

Bains says that the union is working on plans to drill a borehole to help cut down on water expenses that currently stands at an average of Sh100,000 per month in bills.

To make it playable, the water-based edel grass turf requires 14,000 litres of water before every match.

Positive aspect

According to Bains, Ministry of Sports has through Nock approved the construction of the borehole at a cost of Sh2.5 million.

"The quantity of water use per day depends on the number of matches played," said Bains.

The KHU has requested Westlands MP Fred Gumo to support the development programme through Constituency Development Fund. The most positive aspect is that City Park Stadium is a world certified facility and can easily host Olympics and Commonwealth Games matches.

Bains is proud that the KHU is the only federation in Africa to own a stadium as all the rest in the continent are government owned. The new pitch at City Park Stadium is estimated to last 10 years.

The lifespan of the facility is enhanced by the fact that unlike other facilities, hockey is the only event that takes place here.

Bains said: "This is a purely hockey stadium because special shoes are required to use the facility."

"When Harambee Stars came here to have a feel of an artificial turf ahead of their tour of Zimbabwe two years ago, we asked them not to use studded shoes which could destroy the pitch," he recalled. Whereas many people view the mushrooming highrise building next to the stadium as a major challenge to the KHU, Bains thinks otherwise.

He said: "City Park’s case is not unique since there are a lot of stadia in the world, like Mumbai, which are surrounded by tall buildings."

"There is nothing we can do because we can’t chase the tenants away," he said.

But the main challenge facing the federation is to construct standard stadia in other provinces to avoid over dependency on City Park.