West Nile soccer team Onduparaka has taken the Uganda soccer
scene by storm. A few weeks ago they achieved promotion to Uganda’s premier
league. And then as if to prove that it was no a fluke they qualified for the
Uganda Cup final, putting Entebbe to the sword with a 4-0 aggregate victory
over two rounds in the semi-finals.
By the time you read this the Uganda Cup final would have
been decided and you know whether the Onduparaka fairy tale will have run its
course or has grown even bigger.
In Europe summer is sliding in and with it the seasonal flurry
of sporting activity.
The European Football Championships are in full flow, cyclists
are about to start the tortuous Tour de France, the grass court tennis season
is looking to peak at the hallowed grounds of Wimbledon and the British Golf
open will tee off in the west of Scotland in the middle of July.
One cannot help but marvel at the incredible facilities in
which the sportsmen compete, the thousands of the paying public who turn up to
witness these contests and the amounts the sportsmen win for the effort – the
Wimbledon winner will pocket £2m (sh9.5b).
"If you go beyond your-jaw-hitting-the-floor and examine what it has taken to raise sport to such a lucrative endeavour, that sportsmen have found it fit to acquire the bare minimum of education before going off to travel the world and make a living, maybe teams like Ondurapaka will have a sustainable future...
Essentially the growth of sports in Europe went in parallel
with the growth in those economies. The sports facilities started off as a
deployment of surpluses drawn from those economies. These surpluses date back
to the agrarian revolution, swelled into the industrial age and have literally
exploded in the information and now, the conceptual age.
Of course sports have their place in the management of
society. The more cynical will say sports is a useful distraction for the
masses away from the more pressing issues. Sports of course has health
benefits, necessary because our lives are more sedentary we are not out half
the day chase our food around the savannah.
So clearly attaining national sporting excellence requires a
robust economy sustained over years even decades.
In addition there have to be patrons willing to back these
teams. The history of Europe’s top soccer teams is littered with rich
businessmen supporting the clubs and setting a strong foundation for their eventual
glory years.
We have had our share of sporting patrons but their
initiatives have died with them or floundered with the patrons falling
fortunes.
"What the European teams have been able to do, to varying levels of success, which our teams have failed to do, is build a corporate structure that can not only support the teams but ensure they outlive the original patrons...
In short our teams have to become businesses in order to
sustain themselves.
Using Onduparaka as an example, while it has no stadium from
which it can collect revenues, it has a passionate following that contribute to
its finances.
There is the usual company structure that can be employed,
with shareholders and a management that oversees the club’s running or they can
adopt a cooperative structure like Barcelona FC’s , where the club belongs to
the fans who contribute to its up keep regularly and may enjoy a return on
their “investment” every so often, depending on the surplus the club can
generate.
With either structure egos will have to be set aside and
strict corporate discipline adopted.
This template, which can be used for any other sports team
and association is not rocket science but it will not be smooth sailing as well
as differences in opinion between the owners, management and fans will inevitably rock the ship
occasionally. This will test the credibility of the club’s or association’s
vision and mission and depending on how deeply ingrained these are will make
the difference between success and failure.
"The point is, developing a viable sporting infrastructure like you find in Europe is not impossible but we will have to break our way from the self-destructive ways of our current business owners, harness our existing assets and embrace a long term view going years, decades even centuries into the future...
It can be done. The question is have the right conditions of
growing economy, savvy business promoters and sporting challenge come together
yet to make it happen?
Only time will tell.
