A squeaking wheel clearly needs to be oiled or replaced

Talk about wrangles within the local sports federations dominated speeches at the Sports Personality of the Year (SOYA) awards last week with our very own Athletics Kenya featuring prominently.

Soya panel chairperson Evelyn Watta set the mood by revealing that they had had problems coming up with the federation of the year because most sports bodies are currently wrangling.

I can’t fault her because that is the truth of the matter. The Cabinet Secretary Hassan Wario then picked up the baton and took the ‘federation wrangling’ debate to a whole new level amid threats that action is in the offing for the associations caught up in feuding.

He promised that 2015 will be the year of the red card. The Minister especially took on AK but also extensively mentioned Kenya Football Federation and the Kenya Rugby Union. Again, he was not very far from the truth but whether he is serious about taking action I am not sure.

What I am sure about is the total support he has from the public to overhaul the sports federations. The calibre of associations which won the awards leaves no doubt about the adage: “It is easy to be number one but it is certainly very hard to maintain it.”

DIFFICULT YEARS

AK has won Soya accolades but the last two years have been difficult for them. In fact the cabinet secretary’s revelation about what was cooking at AK justified Soya panel’s decision to give the top award to the Kenya Volleyball Federation.

I would, however, like to urge the athletics fraternity not to begrudge the choice but use the occasion and comments from the various leaders as an opportunity to apply effort to improve the sport.

After all as they say, it is only the audience who can tell whether you are dancing well and not yourself. We don’t need to listen to ourselves if we want to succeed, we must read the mood of the crowd. Yes a lot has been going on at AK and I will not go deeper because I happen to be an interested party in the ongoing wrangles.

However, from where I sit, I am sure I am able to see clearly and all I can advise is that it is time to change. Years back athletes used to dominate most categories in Soya but not any more.

Apart from the two top categories, other federations are closing the gap and athletics is being given a run for their money. Who knows what will happen tomorrow?

But if we are to continue dominating the sporting scene, we must change for the better and eliminate the doping menace. Sponsors are equally threatening to pull out with Safaricom CEO Bob Collymore having warned that federations that have unethical practices will not receive the firm’s sponsorship.