Our collective silence continues to embolden bad football practices.
Politicians in Kenya consider late night television a perfect platform to launch an agenda.
And this past week was no different.
Football Kenya Federation (FKF) president Nick Mwendwa elected to not only field an interview on national television so as to ‘launch’ a glittering Premier League trophy, but possibly also gauge the general mood of the country towards his leadership.
The interview was done amid theatrics on the background, coming at a time FKF had controversially swapped the names of Gor Mahia and Tusker as the country’s representatives at the Cecafa Kagame Cup.
Then, two of the country’s biggest clubs namely Gor Mahia and AFC Leopards boycotted a league match in protest over a pay-dispute.
This coming at a time the federation suspended five referees for match manipulation, coming at a time when most teams in the FKF Premier League have publicly complained about suspect or below par officiaiting.
My generation, good people, gleefully rubs its palms at the sight of ‘vayolens’ and Gor Mahia now conjoined with AFC Leopards are plainly serving it to FKF.
An absolute no show at Thika Stadium for a league match by Ingwe and K’Ogalo can be described as the ultimate show of defiance against the country’s football body.
While the money owed to both clubs for their finals appearance in the domestic Cup is the reason they took this unprecedented action, it’s legally hard to relate why they chose to use the league platform to peg FKF and paralyze their biggest showpiece.
That can only lead to one conclusion based on the rejoinder of Sunday’s meltdown of a presser by Mwendwa which resulted in ‘provisional’ bans, and fines worth Sh6 million to Leopards and Sh4 million to Gor.
Like chess holds its master in its own bonds, shackling the mind and brain so that the inner freedom of the very strongest must suffer; that bond of strength is about to be stretched.
While on face value it may look like Gor Mahia and AFC Leopards togetherness in this stopped just one game and brought to shore a few details of the under-deals of sponsorship negotiations; the bigger picture and one which all clubs need to understand is that they are the greatest stakeholders of football and their collective strength can shape football to what they desire it to be.
That desire cannot blossom in an environment of silence because silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Those who feel tormented must rise and if you love Kenyan football you fall in this space.
Let no one make you feel the need to remain silent whether as a fan, referee, journalist, coach, player, administrator, sponsor or any other faction that falls in the football pyramid.
Your voice needs to be heard from your grass-root football association all the way to the top. The old age accusation thrown at anyone making football noise in this country is; you are not a member and this is a member’s club.
The options are simple, become one. Influence the leadership at your county/sub county associations by becoming members of clubs, these clubs/ elected county officials eventually get to shape the present and future of Kenyan football across all pyramids.
The year 2003 still is a strong reminder to what strength in numbers can achieve and to imagine the tyranny today is barely what football had then, it’s a huge disservice top flight clubs do to themselves and those below them by allowing bad leadership to erode its past gains.
We all need to remember that when truth is replaced by silence, the silence is a lie.