With foreign-legion donning the national colours, where are we heading?

It’s quite shocking to find that the current Amavubi Stars’ team is regarded as the second national team of DR Congo. The main reason towards this kind of ‘abuse’ is the failure of the national soccer governing body, Ferwafa to give a chance to Rwandan-born soccer players to feature for their national team. Recently, DR Congo born players, Mbuyu Twite and Kanu made their first debut to the Amavubi Stars’ team without even training with National team during their preparations for Nations Cup qualifier against Cameroon. Mbuyu, a DR Congo-born was named Eric Gasana and his other team mate Kanu was named Theo Tuyisenge, they were given Rwandan citizenships yet they can’t even neither pronounce nor reveal the meaning of simple Kinyarwanda word “Amavubi”! Are these saviours of our nation’s soccer decline on both the CAF/FIFA rankings? Not of course, they will consume the country’s resources and after they will head back home to enjoy the fruits of Rwanda. They won’t even remember that while playing for our nation, we gave them shelter and security. All these players know quite well that they are not Rwandans but still, but they can’t even know that the new adopted homeland has done a lot for them. With several Rwandan teenagers who tirelessly for the ACN fixtures, sacrificed a lot for their country , were left out of the squad for Cameroon on the last minute in favour of the pair without even informing them earlier not to prepare for the trip. To make you understand this statement, both Migi and Serubungo were dropped off the list for Cameroon minutes to departure at Kigali International Airport. To make matters even worse, the coach himself included them in his first eleven players to play against the Indomitable Lions. This shows character of inexperienced coach. The pair never trained with the fellow team mates but only because their physical appearance blinded Ferwafa officials, they expected a deserved victory from them. Of course their soccer standards on the pitch won’t match with the rest of the team members; Mbuyu replaced Elias Ntaganda in the second half of the Cameroon game, wasn’t Olivier Uwingabire a capable substitute? Now Ferwafa, Did Mbuyu or his SA counterpart save from losing to the Indomitable Lions, only Jimmy Gatete found the net from a right substitution of Theoneste Muhayimana. Do you think chance landed on Gatete to score that lone goal? No, it’s only the brilliance that he exhibits and many more Rwandans are capable of exhibiting the same if given the chance to display their skills. Migi, Serubungo, Uwingabire are capable of reviving the country’s soccer lost image. It’s only when we shall give confidence to our grooming national teenagers that Rwanda will resurrect from the ‘dead’. This also reminds me of the 2004 African Cup of Nations when Rwanda made her first appearance to Tunis finals after defeating both Ghana and Uganda in their last group II fixtures. At that time, we had many foreigners in the team though they helped us record the nation’s first maiden appearance in the CAF records...but then are we making a turnover to 2004 period? Now Mbuyu that has made his first debut in the Amavubi Stars’, he is no longer regarded as a Congolese, a feat which is more advantageous to his club, APR. The number of foreigners featuring in their club has reduced, now they are taking a step ahead in signing many foreigners, a thing which has affected the country’s soccer standards. Much as we shall adopt many players to feature in the national team, none of the players shall sacrifice his energy for the betterment of the team than national-born players. More still, this feat has demoralised many soccer teenagers in the country who had interest in featuring for their country, they won’t take soccer a serious profession and they will still consider Ferwafa to have ruined their talents too. For instance, Amavubi Stars’ team is composed of several neutralized Rwandans,If our national soccer federation cared, how does it think that our teenagers will improve or even make it to the national team with all these figures still existing in our national soccer team. Not until we emphasize featuring of Rwandan born or foreign born Rwandan players in the Amavubi Stars, I predict that Rwanda will enjoy the fruits of its youngsters between 2010-2015 period. However, the Amavubi Stars captain, Jimmy Gatete sounded negative towards the pair’s inclusion to the national team. He said, “ It would have been better if the pair was brought at first during the team’s preparation but bringing a player at the last minute without even knowing his football skills was not good,” “At least for Mbuyu, he is well known to be featuring in the Primus League and everyone knows how he plays and he displayed good soccer in Cameroon; infact his addition to the team played a vital role towards our performance in Cameroon,” Gatete said. Gatete further added that stopping foreigner players from featuring from the national team would be best reserved for the soccer federation, Ferwafa. “As the Amavubi captain, I can’t comment on that issue for the meantime,” Gatete said.

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With foreign-legion donning the national colours, where are we heading?