A Normalisation Committee could soon be established to resolve the issues that led the world football governing body, Fifa, to ban Kenya from international competitions, Sports Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed has said.
The CS made the remarks at Parliament Building on Thursday during a session where members sought to know how she would handle a heated dispute that has embroiled the government, Fifa, and the embattled Football Kenya Federation.
Amina lashed out at the ousted federation, citing it as an embodiment of bad leadership that the ministry was keen to scrap.
The CS said deep-rooted financial impropriety by the federation had landed the nation in trouble, including attracting the wrath of Fifa and scaring away potential sponsors.
“As far as FKF is concerned, a lot of sponsors have bolted away from them. I think it was in the public knowledge that they took off because they thought that resources are not being used in the proper way,” Amina said.
“Almost none of the federations comply with the Sports Act. When I came into the ministry, I actually invited all of them and then took them through the Sports Act and also their compliance records and very few have complied with the Act and very few of them have held elections.”
Unless a thorough clean-up is done at the federation, sponsors will continue to shy away from the country, Amina said.
“So there is a lot of work that needs to be done. When you go and source for resources from the sponsors, many are ready to come forward but they have their conditions to be met. Many of them are not domestic firms but international companies.”
“And, therefore, for them to give you the money, you must also be ready to be audited internationally otherwise they'll take away their money.”
Amina said in an effort to clean up the mess in other federations, the ministry would pull off the magic wand that exorcised the ghosts that haunted the cricket association.
“In cricket, I think that the Normalization Committee that was led by Justice Joyce Aluoch and Justice Visram did an amazing job, a really wonderful job.”
“A new constitution is in place and new officials were also elected. The elections were held at night and therefore the team did not sleep because people went to court trying to stop the elections but the court was very fair and ruled that the elections should proceed as arranged.”
“We need to give the new office bearers an opportunity and see how well they will do. I have no doubt in my mind they are going to perform well.”
The CS commended the golf leadership for putting their house in order after initial wrangles had caused a chasm.
“Golf actually took our sides. The two warring entities actually came together and held elections, so the two are now together and are working as one entity that is managing golf.”
