Without moonlighting as an expert on football, I thought I should look at a matter of national importance, which is our national team. I am deliberately reflecting on matters of national importance because my team, Mamelodi Sundowns, is giving me a glow. If I write about them some are going to start saying I am bragging. This is not a time to brag. I will brag in May 2021. My point of departure is the snippet below:
‘Our overriding vision through this plan is to remain consistently in the Top 20 of world football rankings and among the Top 3 on the African continent by 2022’
Kirten Nematandani
The above snippet are the words of the then SAFA President, Kirsten Nematadani visualising Bafana Bafana’s success. Oh! Maybe I should say he was dreaming. Sometimes when you are in a position of power in South Africa it becomes easy to dream. Our leaders always sell us dreams and we have normalised it to an extent that we fail to interrogate or question their slumber. Sometimes I do understand why they do it, because dreaming is nice. Kirsten was dreaming on behalf of SAFA. He was dreaming because there is difference between a dream and a vision. He was dreaming because when you cast a vision, you are positioning yourself for success. Was SAFA positioning the national team for success? The answer is beautiful NO. After performing poorly at the 2010 World Cup here at home, SAFA unveiled its blue-print for football development in South Africa – Technical Masterplan – with the aim of reviving Bafana Bafana. The Technical Masterplan document articulates the vision and choices that SAFA was going to make in ensuring that Bafana Bafana become a football powerhouse. With 2022, around the corner, one can ask where are the results and why the national team is not improving? Bafana Bafana are currently languishing at 71st slot in FIFA rankings and at 14th slot in CAF rankings. The last time our national team impressed the nation was at the 2002 African Cup of Nations co-hosted by Ghana and Nigeria when they finished third with Shaun Bartlett finishing as a top goal scorer. Since then, our national team has consistently underperformed with its “Modimo nthuse” style of play. Bafana Bafana are not going to improve anytime soon, especially with the current dreamers at SAFA House masquerading as visionary, determined and practical leadership. Currently the team is poor and in many people’s eyes it does not demonstrate a positive long-term development. I do not want to talk about the current coach who does not aspire confidence at all.
The continuous underachievement shows that SAFA failed to take a realistic appraisal of where the organisation was when it wanted to assert Bafana Bafana as a world and African football powerhouse. You can only aspire to be somewhere if you understand where you are. Furthermore, without determined leadership, pragmatic implementation plans, and robust monitoring and evaluation systems, planning becomes a meaningless exercise in every organisation. Building a strong, internationally competitive national requires visionary, determined and practical leadership. If we had this kind of leadership and not leaders who are obsessed with power like the former mayor of Port Elizabeth (now Gqeberha), Danny Jordan, maybe by 2022 Bafana Bafana were going to attain top-20 status globally and top 3 on the continent. I mean, only proper leadership was needed to carry out the plan and to continuously monitor it.
Look at a small country like Belgium with a population of +11 million people, arguably the best national team in world football. Unlike South Africa, Belgium understood that national failure can indeed be a catalyst for change. The ability to put goals and objectives into action effectively and efficiently yielded positive results for Royal Belgium Football Association. After their poor showing at the France World Cup in 1998, the FA worked towards reviving the country’s national team. They managed to re-engineer their football through school sports and today they are reaping the benefits. Here at home vision 2022 has been a failure. The unfortunate part is that we all know it is going to continuing being business as usual after 2022. In an ideal world Danny et al would resign and allow visionary, determined and practical leadership to take over. The current SAFA leadership has stopped giving importance to what matters the most (our national team) and there is no accountability. The likes of Danny Jordan are driven by self-importance and personal gain. Hopefully, new people would take over and ensure that intensions are turned into results. Just imagine if Danny Jordan puts the energy, he put into Patrice Motsepe campaign at SAFA. Arguably, Bafana Bafana would be strong and internationally competitive.
By @Thipa_na
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