As an avid sports fan it frustrates me beyond words every time the Olympics come around with Rwanda sending a contingent of athletes to represent us, only for the games to end with nothing to show for it, as is the case with the just concluded Paris Olympics. It leaves a bad taste in the mouth to know that each time our sportsmen and women travel to an Olympic host city, they in fact will not be much better than glorified tourists. ALSO READ: Paris 2024: Rwanda's medal jinx persists, all eyes on remaining athletes Usually, I ask myself: what is the mindset of officials of Rwanda’s sports federations (but especially the head of the Rwanda National Olympic and Sports Committee) every four years when they travel to some games host city with their contingents, only to watch a repetition of the same poor performances as last? Does it bother them? Or are they more content to enjoy the trip, earn their per diem, do some nice shopping, and happily return home? Seriously, what goes through the mind of the head of the athletics federation when, say, Rwanda’s representative in the 10,000m race gets lapped – every time! – after some twelve trips around the track? What must the head of the swimming federation think when they travel with some barely trained young man or woman that inevitably gets eliminated in the first heats? Only they (and their other colleagues) know. What is clear is, they never seem very upset about the woeful lack of achievement, which in turn is a failure of mindset. ALSO READ: Cycling: Diane Ingabire fails to impress at Paris 2024 Games Am I being too harsh with our sports officials? I don’t think so. Facts are facts, and the lack of achievement speaks for itself. Why should we be moaning the fact no Rwandan athlete has ever had a podium finish since the games began? Perhaps we need, as a country, to stop sugarcoating things and be brutally honest about the illness. Let’s not shy away from calling a spade a spade, if not for anything else but as a first step on the road to turning things around. We are sending “glorified tourists” to represent us at the Olympics (or the Commonwealth Games, the World Athletics Championships, All Africa Games and so on). The all-important question is how this will change, beginning with the next games in Los Angeles in four years! One way to devise a solution is to first ask ourselves: what makes the athletes of other countries perform well? Do Kenyans, Ethiopians, Ugandans and others have some God-given ability that we lack? That can’t be the case. We are the same people as our neighbors. One reason why the neighbors I mention perform so much better lies in a simple historical fact: they were never hindered by the kind of politics Rwanda did. This country was for long a very parochial society; one that seemed to intentionally shun interacting with the outside world. This came from the mentality of the Hutu power ideologues that ran the country, whose ruling philosophy was to keep the Rwandan masses as little exposed to the outside world, or outside ideas and influences, as possible. In fact, I would argue that they had absolutely no wish that Rwanda develop as a sporting country because that ran counter to their determination to keep Rwanda closed, and therefore “invisible” to the outside world. Here, I will use an example that best illustrates the ethno-centric thinking of the Parmehutu ideologues (or their MRND successors) that crippled the growth of sport. One of their fears was: what if some “Tutsi-looking” man were to win the Olympic marathon? Wouldn’t that be very dangerous with the potential to turn the focus of the world on their segregationist, even ethnic cleansing, policies against the country’s Tutsi population? Out of the question then! thought the ideologues of hate. That’s just one example. These people were a true stumbling block to the development of sport, as so much else. And so, because in Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, even Burundi (under Jean-Baptiste Bagaza), and elsewhere in Africa, the political climate did not discourage the growth of sport – but rather celebrated the successes of their athletes – they ended up producing world beating athletes. Bikila Abebe, the legendary Ethiopian winner of two Olympic marathons dazzled the world. As did John Akii-Bua, Uganda’s 400m hurdles winner at the Munich games in 1972, the first African athlete to win gold in the event. Meantime Kenya was giving the sports world the likes of Kipchoge Keino, Naftali Temu, Philip Waruinge, and an endless procession of other famous Olympians. Even Burundi has had its gold-medal winner, Venuste Nayingabo, in the 1500m event at the Atlanta games in 96. The value these athletes had in putting their countries on the map was, and is incalculable. This is not mentioning the feel-good factor to the national psyche winning brings about. Even then, all is not doom and gloom. There is good news, if we focus enough on what we have currently. Put simply, the Kagame administration is putting in place good sports infrastructure – thus overcoming one of the main hindrances of the past. Also, it has (long) done away with the parochial, inward-looking mentality of past regimes. Now, we are second to none when it comes to using sport as a marketing tool, to put Rwanda on the map. The only problem we have is, we haven’t started winning. In order for that to happen mindsets have to change in our sports federations. Those that run them better shift their whole mentalities. They had better stop thinking as tourists, and start seeing themselves as directors of sports programs with a solemn obligation to win national glory through medals.
