INVESTMENT AND SPORTS: Kenyan sportsmen and women put their money into good use

The building belongs to Moses Tanui. 07.03.2017.PHOTOS BY PETER OCHIENG/STANDARD

High-earning professional sportsmen and women have always been lured by  lavish spending.

Most of the earnings that come along with their fame typically last less than a decade, hence making them struggle and live in anguish after retiring from sport.

Is it a case of mismanagement of funds or not making hay while the sun shines?

But how footballers, athletes and other sportsmen in the country survive comfortably until retirement and beyond seems a redundant question.

Although the Kenyan sport has had its share of tales of bankruptcy, debts and divorce dominating athletes’ lives, some of them have beaten the odds.

Most of them are now living in opulence just like their foreign counterparts, allowing them to drive luxury cars and own a lot of property in the country. Eldoret town has more of the buildings.

 

Footballers, led by the Wanyama brothers, Victor (Tottenham Hotspur) and Italy-based McDonald Mariga as well as recently signed Guizhou Zhicheng (China) striker Michael Olunga are some of the few footballers who have used their high earnings to live their dreams.

While at Southampton, Victor Wanyama is reported to have bought a house valued at Sh20 million in Kileleshwa in 2014 before he forked out millions of shillings to fly his family to England for a month-long holiday in 2016. Victor went ahead to ship a high end car valued at Sh25 million into the country for his family early last year.

Athletes

Mariga and Wanyama are also said to have bought a number of plots as well as a house for their parents.

Olunga, who recently joined Guizhou Zhicheng from Swedish side Djurgardens for Sh400 million, has reportedly purchased an apartment along Mombasa road.

Former Kenyan international Dennis Oliech’s family also owns many plots, flats and runs the Mama Oliech Restaurant at Chaka Place, Hurlingham Nairobi.

Well-travelled Tusker striker Allan Wanga is one of the few local footballers living in opulence. Wanga owns a house, a rent-car fleet of cars, Nella Fitness Centre (gymnasium) as well as an entertainment joint in Rongai.

Former Kenyan international Boniface Ambani, an accountant by profession, is the proprietor of Bochend Sports Company; a sports kitting company that deals in sports merchandise. His company kits several football teams including AFC Leopards, Posta Rangers, Muhoroni Youth, Chemelil Sugar, Zoo Kericho, Wazito and Nakumatt.

He also supplies the playing kit to General Service Unit and Prisons Kenya volleyball teams as well as the Police hockey team.

Top volleyballer Jane Wacu has invested in the matatu industry and owns several plots, while Rwanda national team coach Paul Bitok owns Paul Bitok Academy in Eldoret.

 

Athletes

While footballers and other sportsmen and women are investing in Nairobi, world beating athletes have literally made Eldoret town a picturesque of world’s major cities.

From New York to Johannesburg; Rotterdam to Rieti and Chicago to Mexico then Berlin Centre to El Pariso in Spain –all welcome you to Eldoret.

The town, which is billed as the City of Champions, now glows with the marathon dollars thanks to athletics talent glut.

A majority of the modern buildings bear the names of big cities and famous races around the world where their owners clinched victory.

You will see Mexico Centre, Rotterdam Centre and El Pariso Restaurant on the Iten Road. Then Grand Prix Hotel, Johannesburg Plaza, Rieti House and Chicago Centre in downtown.

There is Berlin Centre, a sprawling housing units in Kimumu, on the suburbs of Eldoret. Eldoret has experienced rapid change since its inception as railway station Number 64 in colonial times.

It now boasts multi-million shilling modern buildings that have drastically changed its skyline, making it a vibrant commercial hub linked by road and rail to the rest of East and Central Africa.

The athletes are now buying up land as well as purchasing existing homes. Many of Kenya’s world-beaters are bringing their wealth back to the town.

Today, they own almost half of Eldoret, the county’s capital and Kenya’s fourth biggest town, where they have invested in high rise buildings and houses in posh estates.

Their entry into property market has boosted land prices in the town and its suburbs. Almost all the top athletes live in Elgon View, the equivalent of Nairobi’s leafy Muthaiga. In the town’s central business district, there are at least 20 commercial buildings owned by the athletes, who either come from the area or who migrated to the region.

They include the Komora Centre, owned by three time world 3,000m steeplechase champion Moses Kiptanui, and the Grand Prix Hotel, which belongs to two-time Boston Marathon winner Moses Tanui. Kiptanui, who also owns the Komora Estate in London and also owns Utamaduni House along Kenyatta Street in Eldoret, was the first man to run the steeplechase in under eight minutes, while Tanui was the first to run a half marathon in less than an hour.

Komora Centre was named after Komora village in Marakwet, which is known for producing the world’s best steeplechase runners.

Tanui was among the first to win IAAF Grand Prix races and thus derived his building’s name, Grand Prix.

Laban Rotich, a former 1,500m runner, won the prestigious IAAF World Cup 1,500m final in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1998.

And since the World Cup stood out as the biggest win in his athletics career, he named the building Johannesburg Plaza, which is at the junction of Oloo and Nandi streets.

Evans Cheruiyot, the 2008 Chicago Marathon winner, dedicated his Rotterdam Centre to his half marathon victory in Rotterdam in 2007.

The runners are also building rental houses on the outskirts of Eldoret. Military Games sensation Sammy Kipketer owns a four-storey building next to Iten bus terminus while Ibrahim Hussein, the first African to win the New York marathon, owns a building at the heart of the town.

The 1999 Amsterdam Marathon winner Fred Kiprop owns Kirem Arcade that houses K-Rep Bank.

Three-time London Marathon winner Martin Lel also has a building in the town while James Kipsang Kwambai, the second best marathoner in the world in 2009, has bought a plot near Moi Street which he is planning to develop.