How Hussein steered Kenya to World Champs bid triumph

Ibrahim Kipkemboi Hussein, a three-time Boston Marathon winner and chairman of Kenya’s World Athletics Championships bid committee. [Stephen Rutto, Standard]

When the World Athletics (WA) Council declared Nairobi the official host of the 2029 World Championships, one man was quietly following the historic announcement from a hospital bed.

That man is Ibrahim Kipkemboi Hussein, a three-time Boston Marathon winner and chairman of Kenya’s World Athletics Championships bid committee.

He spearheaded a lean team that took on big cities to bring the championships to Kenyan soil. It will be the first time the event is staged on the African continent.

Hussein, who hosts the global Sirikwa Classic World Cross Country Tour at Lobo Village in Eldoret, was bedridden, recovering from surgery to treat a nagging back problem.

The legend underwent the surgical procedure last Friday, just three days before the big announcement.

Hussein says he is elated to have been part of the team that presented a successful World Championships hosting bid.

“I’m happy that I can walk (after surgery). Kenyans are appreciating that the country has been honoured with the responsibility of hosting the 2029 World Athletics Championships. I thank AK and particularly the federation’s President Jack Tuwei,” said Hussein during an interview on Friday.

He said Kenya had narrowly missed the opportunity to host the 2025 World Championships, which went to Tokyo, but did not give up.

The lean team had representation from Athletics Kenya (AK), the Ministry of Sports and Nairobi City County.

Hussein says he worked closely with the bid evaluation panel from World Athletics as Kenya mounted a strong bid. When the country expressed interest in hosting the biennial event, Hussein says his team was given the Event Organisation Agreement, which was immediately signed. “There are many events that WA oversees, but the World Championships is the biggest event and the global governing body guards it and ensures that a host country has the capacity to host their premier event successfully,” says Hussein.

The committee, according to Hussein, quickly gelled and carefully studied the country’s strengths and weaknesses.

Hussein had a good team that comprised AK Chief Administrative Officer Susan Kamau and a representative from Sports Fund. Fatma Awale, who chaired the bid for the 2025 World Championships, which was unsuccessful, was also part of the support team.

“We sat, strategised and engaged with the bid evaluation panel and we must thank them because they guided us on what was required. My team tied its bid with World Athletics’ vision of hosting the World Championships across all the continents. Our analysis showed that Africa had not hosted the competition since the inaugural edition in Helsinki in 1983,” Hussein said.

He added: “It has always been staged in Europe, Asia and North America. But Africa and South America have never hosted it and we saw an avenue there. With our contribution through participating in all the championships since 1983 and our athletes having contributed in building the event through their performances, we felt that it was time. We read the mood of the WA council members and they said that there was no problem with Africa hosting the 2029 edition.”

Ethiopia factor

The Kenyan bid team had been constituted nearly three years ago, but its neighbour Ethiopia was also in the race and nearly complicated Kenya’s bid to host the world’s biggest athletics extravaganza.

Kenya and Ethiopia were among seven countries that expressed interest, with both coming from Africa.

Others were the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, South Korea and India.

Hussein says Kenya had planned to use Africa’s failure to get an opportunity to host the event since its inception as a reason for consideration, but two nations were now eyeing the hosting rights.

During a five-day observer programme at the 2025 Tokyo World Championships, Kenya’s team displayed unmatched seriousness by attending every session, Hussein reveals.

“But we were faced with this complication of two athletics giants from Africa contesting the hosting rights. Kenya had demonstrated already that it had previously successfully hosted global events.

“The rules did not allow a country to antagonise another’s bid, and that would bar Kenya from talking about its advantages over Ethiopia. We felt that it would be complicated if Ethiopia became serious. The rules only allow you to speak about your country’s achievements and what you will do, and not antagonise anyone. Silently, we were praying that Ethiopia joins us so that we bid together for one African country,” the bid chairman says.

According to Hussein, Ethiopia appeared with a strong team accompanied by a high-level government delegation during the first day of the observer programme, a move that he says scared Kenya.

It was after the observer sessions that Kenya and other nations officially expressed their interest before jetting back to the country with their prequalification forms.

Lessons from failed 2025 bid

Upon returning to Kenya from the observer event in Tokyo, Hussein’s team critically examined what caused their 2025 failure.

Kenya had attended the observer programme at the 2023 Budapest World Championships and already knew the requirements.

“We lost the 2025 bid because evaluators emphasised sponsorship and financial muscle,” says Hussein.

He goes on: “This is a WA event and they get part of their revenue from it, and they wanted a country that was more stable and secure financially at the time, and Tokyo had the muscle.” The bid chairman, who is still recovering from the surgical operation, says Kasarani was not in the same state that it is today when Kenya bid for the 2025 show.

“Our sports infrastructure has undergone tremendous transformation since our last bid and these improvements impressed the evaluation panel. But we discovered that there were a few requirements that had been introduced in Tokyo, setting the bar even higher,” Hussein, who heads a development centre for WA in Africa, said.

Tough bidding process

Hussein recalls a difficult bidding process, which was endured by his team.

He says the team was keen on the venue of the event and alternative stadia for training, as well as the hotels that will host visitors, including technical officials and athletics teams from across the world in 2029.

Hussein further disclosed how the WA team strictly monitored Nairobi’s security and traffic from the sampled hotels to the venue and training facilities.

“The bidding was like an examination. You are given a form and the bid evaluation panel will assess and confirm whether you said the truth or you lied. We filled the bid evaluation forms in April and were comfortable because we were meeting the expectations,” he said.

He says compliance officials, Council members and some senior WA managers asked tough questions, which Hussein says were adequately answered.

In the bidding team’s initial assessment, more than 2,000 athletes were expected in Nairobi, and the evaluation group wanted hotels that would treat them equally.

“Putting some teams in five-star hotels and others in two-star is discriminatory and is not allowed. On that requirement, we are lucky because the hospitality industry in Nairobi has been growing rapidly in recent years, and is already booming,” Hussein said.

He further said: “The delegation assessed various top-class hotels in the city and gave them a clean bill of health. What is remaining is negotiation for hotel rates that are comparable to other countries.”

His team, the legend said, was at the time, in May, getting encouraging feedback from the evaluators.

Marathon course

It is interesting that the 2029 World Championships will be the last one to feature a marathon.

Remember, Kenya had hosted the last edition of the World Under-18 Championships in 2017, and history is almost repeating itself when it hosts an event that will have the final classic distance.