Africa-Press – Rwanda. There is a proverb in my local Ghanaian Asante Twi language which goes by “Yenfa yafunu pan nhyen Basel aben” which is loosely translated as “we don’t play the trumpet of the Basel church on an empty stomach.”
This proverb is very deep as it cuts across all spheres of life as well as all professions. Getting what one deserves and has been agreed upon in a job goes a long way to serve as a big motivation for the person to give his maximum best.
Football is a very delicate sport, is one sport which is very diversified as it entails a lot of things. Many factors go into football and it eventually makes or breaks the players on the field.
One has to be in the correct frame of mind before entering the field which will enable him to make decisions in a split second, one has to also be motivated enough and one has to eat well so as to have the needed energy to perform on the pitch.
In some parts of Africa, football club owners and those running clubs do not see the sport as a “job” for the players who are the main elements. They rather feel that they are doing the players a favor by signing them.
It is very common to see footballers going almost a year without salaries in this continent. When they come out to express their sentiments and frustration they are tagged as “bad nuts”. We tend to forget their livelihood and 98 percent of them do not have any job aside from sport.
Player revolts in football are as old as the sport itself. It didn’t start in this 21st century and it will never end. We must agree that it is part of the game. Strike is mainly due to unpaid wages. If players are paid, it’s all fine with them.
Rwanda Primus National League club Kiyovu Sports have reportedly gone five months without paying their players. A club which for the last two seasons has been very dominant despite losing the league title to APR on the final day of the competition on both occasions is now in tatters, there is total anarchy as players have not received their salaries since October 2023.
Player agitations and revolts are normal in football. It even happens in the biggest football tournament in the world: the World Cup. In the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, Ghana’s Black Stars, led by skipper Asamoah Gyan, protested against playing their first game against the United States on June 16, 2014 until they received the $100,000 appearance fee each.
The Ghanaian Ministry of Sports had to fly the money to Brazil in a packed suitcase before the players honored the game. Yes! Those were players who were playing professional football at Chelsea, AC Milan, Juventus, Stade Rennes and others. They weren’t poor though.
Kiyovu skipper Oliver Niyonzima is not a saint and I am not here to defend him. Yes, he has had his disciplinary issues over the years.
On November 16, 2021, he was indefinitely suspended from Amavubi for leaving the national team camp after a 2022 World Cup qualifier against Kenya in Nairobi. He had to apologize before finding his way back into the team.
On Tuesday, March 12, Kiyovu Sports announced that they suspended Niyonzima for six months for inciting his colleagues not to play the league game against Etoile de l’Est which they lost 1-0 in Ngoma because they have not been paid their arrears for five months.
Any skipper, leader or top player who has influence in the dressing room can undoubtedly do what Niyonzima did. He is not fighting for himself but for the whole entire group. Just last season, Moro Sumaila and other key players at Etincelles also boycotted training and other activities due to unpaid salaries, it took the club management to engage the players before calm was restored.
With Niyonzima, one does not know what transpired between him, the club and his other colleagues before he supposedly came out that they should not play against Etoile de l’Est. We can’t blame him, the approach he used might not be appropriate but he is acting as a leader of the playing body and you can’t begrudge him.
The six month-ban imposed on Niyonzima looks very harsh. Firstly, if they had paid the players this wouldn’t have happened.
Again the management should look at the broader picture, Niyonzima is a key element in the national team. He has been instrumental in Amavubi’s two world cup qualifiers against Zimbabwe and South Africa. The country is now on top of Group B and they will face Benin and Lesotho in June.
Coach Torsten Spittler needs the midfielder and other key players to be very active on national team duty.
Suspending Niyonzima is like piercing a dagger in the heart of the nation. The star midfielder needs to be active at club level to give his best in the national team and it is not appropriate for Kiyovu to suspend him at this time with just three months to two crucial world cup qualifiers.
The least Kiyovu could do is to leave the player alone or better still find him an amount for what they term as “inciting” other players.
We are not here to pass judgment and any skipper who cares about his colleagues’ welfare will absolutely do what Niyonzima did without thinking twice.
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