Preparation pace too slow for London Games

It beats common understanding how one expects to reap what they never sowed. You reap what you sow, isn’t that how the old adage goes? You can’t plant eggplant seeds and then expect to harvest pineapples; it’s that simple, as the difference between night and day. If you have been following sports in this country over the last couple of years, you will realize that the people in administrative posts are very good at talking the walk, but when it comes to walking the talk, they absolutely go missing. For instance, the government and all the other people concerned, mainly Ferwafa, the local football governing body, invested several hundred millions (Rwandan Francs) and so incalculable interest in the U17 team , and we all saw the result. It means, when the will is there, there will always be a way—which leads me to the real hub of this article. Why can’t we show the same attitude as we did with the U17 team to the rest of the games where we have a competitive advantage? I know some people are going to say, let’s do one thing at a go…and I will understand, but what about the government and all the people concerned do a little bit better whenever it comes to preparing the athletes for major championships, especially the Olympic Games. The 2012 London Games are barely a year away yet we can hardly count two Rwandan athletes, who have qualified, and as the state of affairs stand at the moment, it’s hard to see where the next [to qualify] will come from. But the funny part is that, it’s not that the athletes are incapable of achieving the minimum qualification mark, but because they’re always ill-prepared, something that we can only blame on the responsible people. The main culprits include the individual federations that are [supposed] to be charge of their respective athletes, the national Olympic Committee which is [supposed] to be overall overseers of the athletes being prepared to search for the qualification mark or [being] prepared for the actual Games. Without a few wild card invitations from the International Solidarity Fund that we normally rely on, it remains to be seen if we can actually raise a team of more than five athletes, yet we had four years to prepare! Only cyclist, Adrien Niyonshuti has qualified, we could get one or two invitations in swimming and or boxing, none of guys of athletics has qualified; basketball and volleyball have a toll order to make the grade—and the clock of ticking away. Now, two of the athletes supposed to be the county’s main hopes in as far as achieving the minimum require mark are most likely going to miss the upcoming IAAF World Championships in Daegu, South Korea because they could not get visas. Veteran campaigner Epiphanie Nyirabarame and the country’s top male runner, Sylvain Rukundo were going to use the championship to try and get the required times, which would put them with no added pressure when they go to competing at the All Africa Games next month in Maputo. The athletics federation officials had all the time in the world to process the visas for their athletes, but they preferred to wait until it’s practically too late. Why can’t people learnt from past mistakes? This same federation has a rather impressive record when it comes to their athletes missing major championships due to visa problems. The same federation has seen internal wrangles reduce it from being one of the most effective in the country to its current state, where the executive committee is only living to se another day.nku78@yahoo.com