African Leaders Must Watch More Football

I never knew I would love football until that day in 2001 a friend of mine ran me through the on-field exploits of one ‘black’ French player who was playing for an English club at the time. That friend of mine introduced me to something good, for, from that day, I’ve come to learn a lot about football beside the obvious physical element involved.

First, I should start with an apology—all my examples will be from the English Premier League. If I tell you the local team I support, we'll straight turn enemies because here supporting different teams is like supporting different political parties; it breeds enmity. I want to avoid that.

To my subject.

Football entails competition, great, great competition. Teams sweat blood to outdo each other for some gold hidden behind that plastic capsule of ordinary air. It is this element that compels me to draw some similarities or even contrasts between this game and the bloody game of politics, African politics.

One similarity between football and politics is that they both involve an element of competition though from differing approaches and for different results altogether. The competition in football is done on a safe level playing field. Politics on the other hand is played on a kind of mine field—an undulating terrain littered with bribery, intimidation, underhand dealings and death.

The competition in the two games goes by some rules, different rules though, for one is a set of normal sensible rules, and the other, law of the jungle.

One article I read a few years ago on the power of sports defined football as a collection of rules. That article said all we watch in sports is a collection of rules and nothing more. It said, for following the rules, the players and their supporters are rewarded, and for breaching the rules, the players and the supporters get punished.

Each side must contain eleven players, one of whom, goalie. The goalie is the only player in the field to use hands when playing. He or she will use the hands only in his or her area; he or she cannot go to the opponent goalkeeper’s area to use his hands there. And for the general outfield players, you never at all use a hand to score. Scoring itself is a set of rules; you break one of them, your goal will not count.

In football, although there could be space between the players and the opponent goalie, there is a limit to which you can use that space—you must be in the same line with the opponent so you will fight from the same advantage or disadvantage. They call it offside, if you stand close to the opponent goal way away from the opponent outfield players.

All the 22 players listen to one man who uses the ordinary whistle to ensure each one of these 100,000-pounds-plus-a-week earners obeys every line of these rules. This man in called the referee. In politics, at elections, he would be known as electoral commission chair.

Football is played in 90 minutes, after that you have to accept your time to redeem yourself is gone. There is no third term in football. In African politics you never leave the arena alive. In Africa you can accept to plunge a fine nation into chaos on ‘the necessity of a few more individual dinners’.

In politics, the referee at elections is chosen by those in power for those in power. His mission is to see the bosses carry the day. This man or woman owes no allegiance to the public. How can he when the public wield no power? You would worry about the legitimacy and consequences of the outcome; he has no time for that; he’s a man on a mission.

In football there are limits beyond which you can never celebrate your victory of the field of play. If after scoring, you go taunt your opponent, you risk suspension. In politics, the man or woman you beat becomes the subject of ridicule, your object; you can say anything about them, and power stripped of them, they will have nothing to use for defence. So, in African politics, the loser is paraded on television, accused, judged, sentenced and arraigned. The acting is nothing but a show to would-be aspirants never to dare take that path lest they should they should end up in similar shame.

This contrasts sharply with happenings in football where the loser is appreciated for giving the winner a run for his money. In football, the loser hugs the winner; the winner hugs the loser. In football, the winner and the loser exchange jerseys—emotional memento.

I am not sure politics knows quality, but I know for sure football minus quality becomes a different game.

Not long ago, Manchester United fans in the English Premiership were baying for their Manager’s blood for playing, not bad football, for you could not say they were bad when they were on number 3 out of 20 teams, but for playing a form of football deprived of ‘the attack brand’ associated with wearing a Man U jersey.

On the same, Adidas, which in July 2014 signed a 10-year contract worth £750 million to make Manchester United kit, said they were still supporting the team ‘albeit their recent style of play’. In short, Adidas, a quality conscious institution it is, was asking for quality play.

In politics if you ask those in power for quality or for results, you are creating an early grave for yourself. Those in power ‘won’ at the elections and are given the blank cheque to run their country the way they deem ‘appropriate’.

Politics is littered with jealousy of every stature and age. There is no jealousy in football. When one Arsenal legend, Thierry Daniel Henry, was asked to mention names of defenders he remembers for giving him a run for his money, he said: “Ledley King for being smart” and ‘Rio Ferdinand for being a kind of wall or bulwark”. Ledley King was a Tottenham Hotspur defender. If you know the feeding relationship between a cat and a rat, you know Tottenham and Arsenal, period. But Henry was able to tell the world who he respected as far as smart or fair defending is concerned and it was a Tottenham man.

In politics, if you would dare mention the success of a political opponent whether in the name of party or individual, you are done with; your career is over. This is never the case in football.

Until a couple weeks ago, Andy Cole, a former Manchester United player was the Premiership’s record holder for second most goals scored, only behind Alan Shearer, the all-time leading goal scorer. Cole’s history was broken by Wayne Rooney in a game against Swansea. Andy Cole wrote: “I was at Old Trafford on Saturday when Wayne Rooney scored a great back-heeled goal to put United ahead. . . . It wasn’t only a quality finish which ended an eight-game run without a win, but it meant that he moved ahead of me to go second in Premier League’s all-time top scorer chart with 188 goals behind Alan Shearer…. I was pleased for United and for Wayne and went to Carrington this week to see him and congratulate him.”

How on earth do you say good of someone that has just made you look not that important any longer! Football does that, and it does it openly.

You know Rafa Benitez. Benitez was a Real Madrid coach, but was sacked for failing to meet the aspirations and standards of the team. Now Madrid has a caretaker coach, Zinedine Zidane. When taking over, Zidane said it is important to appreciate the foundation laid by his predecessor, the sacked Benitez. And Benitez in his statement wished Zidane and Madrid well, saying: “I want everyone at the club from the board of directors, executives, workers and all of the fans to know that it has been an honour and privilege to be in charge at this club . . . As a Madridista from Madrid, steeped in the traditions and values of this institution, which I learned in the old sports city of Castellana, it has been an honour to work for these colours. . . I would like to wish good luck to Zinedine Zidane, my successor, and his staff. . . .”

So people can appreciate the work of their predecessor and remain respected?

Well, football says that’s a possibility.

In football you are judged by results; it is a performance based endeavour.

Not long ago, Chelsea, another English Premier League giant, parted ways with one of football’s greatest coaches, Jose Mourinho. Only a few months ago, Mourinho delivered to the club the coveted English Premier League championship. But when his team could not replicate their last year’s exploits, the club had to tell the Special One it was time he left. I have already said of Real Madrid and their Benitez. At Manchester United, David Moyes, was given a similar dose. And before Moyes, several other coaches, including Steve McClaren, then England Coach but now at Newcastle, experienced the same fate: no results, no job.

On the same subject of performance, the Arsenal Manager, Arsene Wenger has often been criticised for putting too much trust in youth and for taking a rigid stance on spending on experience. Whenever he goes on a terrible run of form, this resurfaces, and this, despite the supporters’ full knowledge of him being instrumental in building the Emirates Stadium while still maintaining a decent style of play.

The subject of building the Emirates has reminded me of something. In Africa, that building would be called ‘Dr’ Arsene Wenger International Stadium. And this would stand regardless of the sponsor’s reasoning to the contrary. To make things worse, that stadium would be a place where women would gather to shower praise on ‘Dr’ Arsene.

In football, no matter how close your brother is to you, if he doesn’t play well, he has no room in playing for your team. There, they do not go by names; they go by the ability to perform and this is on merit. In politics, my wife, my brother, my in-law are all ‘good politicians’.

In football, you prepare some to take over and this happens on merit. There are youth academies to build youth into experience to take over from the aged. In politics, you never train youths lest they should rely on their power and charisma to usurp power from you. In Malawi there is a story of what happened to a trusted Minister to the first Head of State, after he had told a Zambian newspaper that he thought he would easily become the country’s head of state in the event of the death or otherwise of the leader then. When he returned, he was made to pay for aspiring the ascendancy. In Africa only one person is a leader; you must never show interest in a seat on which is a person.

In football, players are organized into a team. In other words, football entails team work. In politics, all the praise goes to the leader or you risk losing his support and therefore ‘opportunities’ in wealth accumulation. In football, a trophy won is lifted by the captain, but eventually it is property of every player there and the club and its supporters. Not in politics; in politics even money donated is still attributed to the leader.

I’m not saying all is smooth in football, no. There is corruption in football; players or managers can be on each other’s neck, but football treats differences in a far better and completely different yet efficient way for the good of the game and those who love it.

I think two instances should be in order here. The subject of the first is Benitez/Mourinho.

When Benitez was taking over at Real Madrid, his wife said Benitez was going to make right what Mourinho had made wrong at Madrid. Mourinho in return, asked her to take care of her man’s diet, apparently requesting her to mind her man’s weight, for Benitez was gaining weight.

The second also involves the same man, Mourinho, who mocked Guardiola (then Guardiola was a Barcelona coach) saying a person who enjoys football never loses his hair. Guardiola is bald, and Maurinho was poking fun at that ‘loss of hair’.

In short, it is not smooth-sailing in football, but unlike politics, football seeks open and quicker means to fix its problems. Currently, the world football’s governing body, FIFA, is undergoing the worst of times following revelations of corruption and bribery in high places. Despite this, football largely remains a very well-organised game supported by equally powerful infrastructure.

Recently, Sam Allardyce, Sunderland Manager said Liverpool manager, Jurgen Klopp, was the reason for the injury crisis at Liverpool. When Klopp expressed dissatisfaction with Allardyce’s sentiments, Allardyce straight away said, “Sorry.” In politics you would tell a person who would criticise you to go hang; in politics you never say sorry to an opponent.

Politics and football are both wonderful games but Africa has made the former look a pathway to hell. I know some people call politics a dirty game, but honestly I do not know its proper name in Africa. Of course, I am sure of football, this greatest game that transcends races and geography, a game I would place somewhere just below religion.

Problems dogging Africa can never go if we keep procrastinating. Through a spirit of humility and honesty, we must reason with our leaders to embrace the culture of love, unity, tolerance, humility and honesty. I personally do not believe in bullying our leaders or in beating them into submission; I believe in reasoning with them so decisions made are collectively owned, and are for the good of us all. This springs from my conviction that the last thing Africa needs is strife because in strife a thing that took ages to build can go up in flames in a matter of seconds only to haunt us with the burden to rebuild, something that takes even more years and resources to stand. In short, no matter our differences, Africa or parts therein must never accept use of bloodshed or destruction to resolve issues. I think football can teach us a few tricks on this.