Why Kimanzi wants new FKF office to embrace criticism and technology

Former Harambee Stars head coach Francis Kimanzi. [Stafford Ondego, Standard]

“For the Kenyan football to be revived and taken to the next level, those in power must accept criticism, invest in youth and go scientific.”

Those were the words for former Harambee Stars coach Francis Kimanzi after Hussein Mohammed was elected as Football Kenya Federation (FKF) president at Kasarani Gymnasium on Saturday.

The 47-year-old experienced football administrator was second time lucky as he finally achieved his delayed dream of being the Kenyan football boss since losing to Sam Nyamweya in 2011.

Considered as hope for the most loved game in the country, Hussein’s herculean task will be to restore the Kasarani-based federation’s reputational damage overseen by his embattled predecessor Nick Mwendwa.

From poor leadership, to constant wrangles, mismanagement, embezzlement of funds, match fixing claims, lack of sponsorship, victimization of dissenting stakeholders and poor infrastructure the Extreme Sports CEO has a full-in tray as he begins his four-year tenure at Kandanda House.

While giving credit to the previous regime which he worked as Harambee Stars coach and Caf A-certified instructor for building coaches’ capacity, Kimanzi urged the new office to only take the positives from their predecessors as they strongly focus on investing on talent and embrace technology.

“There's a disconnect between the development aspect of the game and the target of the country as a whole. Every season or every qualifier there is a generation that is either wasted or killed. And if you kill a lot of generations, then you cannot complain about producing talent. It means there's something we are getting wrong,” Kimanzi told Standard Sports.

“We have to be also honest because the new office is not going to work in a vacuum. There's already something that has been done and left behind. There's a talented U20 team that we saw competing in Tanzania a few weeks ago. We just need to polish and take it to the next level. There's also a lot of great job that was done by the outgoing office in terms of building the coaches' capacity. We cannot change the game because the game is still the same. We only need to catch up with the evolution of the game.”

Fear factor

Even as he feels fear of victimisation among coaches, players, and other stakeholders affect the progress of the game, the 48-year-old former Tusker, Mathare United, Wazito and Sofapaka coach said there is no short cut to success in modern football.

“In our context, a terminology like criticism is always considered as negative whenever mentioned; people think that you have already downplayed them. But to be honest, criticism is very good for the development of the game. So, people should not be afraid to highlight what things should be developed or improved because it is the only way to develop the game,” Kimanzi said.

“We have to make sure we standardise things, and remain focused. I'm thinking about a leadership that can set some structures that are also measurable. They just need some activation because when you talk about the basic football, you go to the primary schools. There is the CBC programme that is supporting football in terms of development. We can pull sponsors around, but if we don't have a good roadmap of how to do it, we might also find ourselves again just going round.”

The Dutch-trained Kimanzi has strongly been linked to the vacant Harambee Stars head coach job following the resignation of the troubled Engin Firat on Wednesday. Kimanzi has coached Harambee Stars thrice.

He led Stars to their best ever position ,68th, on the Fifa rankings globally during his first stint in 2008. His second tenure ended unceremoniously in November 2020 almost a year after succeeding his former boss Sebastiane Migne.

His exit saw Kenya bottle their 2021 Africa Cup of Nations qualification chances after they easily donated four points to Comoros.