Does Sports Kenya know its mandate?

[Courtesy]

Pius Metto. That name is never on the lips of many Kenyan sports lovers. It is not a name Kenyans, especially football fans, will utter whenever things go wrong within dressing and boardrooms of local football clubs, or even Harambee Stars.

To write that Mr Metto is little-known might not be fair. He is known in political circles, especially in Nandi Hills, which he had desired to represent in Parliament during the 2017 General Election under Jubilee, the political party that swore to build five, then nine, ultra-modern stadiums. In politics, his nom de guerre is ‘Arap Maraba’.

Sports fans, however, took notice of Mr Metto on Friday when it emerged that Gor Mahia FC, which has a game against RS Berkane of Morocco on April 7 might not play at Kasarani Stadium. Two days earlier, Mr Metto, had written to Ambrose Rachier, the chair of Gor Mahia informing him that Kasarani Stadium would not be available for their Confederation of African Football (CAF) quarter-final tie “due to earlier scheduled event”.

Like the good politician that he is, Mr Metto took that “opportunity to thank you (Mr Rachier) for wanting to utilise our facilities.”

To make matters better, on Friday, he fired off another letter “following the complaints in the Social Media (sic) we wish to advise that Kasarani Stadium was booked by another client in February 2019 which we confirmed as per our procedures… we, therefore, advise you to seek for (sic) another venue. Once again, we regret for (sic) the inconvenience.” 

By some stroke of bad luck, and poor grammar, Mr Metto is the Director General of Sports Kenya, the entity that manages Kasarani Stadium and Nyayo National Stadium. Sports Kenya (SK) is a State corporation, established by the Sports Act, 2013 and given the mandate to carry out functions formerly performed Sports Stadia Management Board and the Department of Sports.

While it is true these sports facilities can be hired out to non-sporting firms so that SK generates income, it betrays the core mandate of SK when a non-sporting entity gets preference and then the sporting entity is blamed for not booking the venue in time.

In all the letters Mr Metto wrote concerning the Gor Mahia- RS Berkane tie, he not only proved how clueless he is as to why Gor Mahia did not contact them last year (they had to play matches in order to beat other teams and qualify first, then wait for a draw to be done so that they could get the fixture) to book Kasarani for the April 7 match, but he also displayed his poor memory since he does not seem to remember the vision and mission of Sports Kenya.

Again, there is nothing wrong with hiring out the stadium for non-sporting events so as to raise funds, but there are so many other ways of making the stadium a cash cow without compromising the purpose the venue was built for: Sporting events.

In other climes where football clubs have their own stadiums, the teams or the stadium management raise funds by incorporating the stadium into the city’s or town’s tourism circuit.

Apparently, for Mr Metto’s SK, Kasarani and Nyayo are brick and mortar behemoths that can only accommodate fans or shoppers, and when those two are not there, then they are just empty buildings that decorate Nairobi’s skyline. So far, there is no tourism brochure, for Nairobi County, or Kenya in general, which incorporates Nyayo and Kasarani as sites that foreign tourists, or locals, can tour and be charged for it.

Probably Mr Metto knows of such income-generating ideas, but for his poor memory: Why else would he forget the mission and vision of Sports Kenya and give the impression that any income-generating activity is game even if it does not work towards promotion of sports?

Even though the matter was resolved and Gor Mahia will now play at Kasarani, the antics of Mr Metto for those 48 hours will make many wonder if he really knows the role of Sports Kenya. Or even his role as the Director General of a State corporation mandated with managing only two sports venues.