… a bone to pick with local businesses
Among all moving creatures on earth, human beings have the greatest potential for using intelligence to perform highly complex tasks and the skill for using this valuable potential is simply referred to as thinking.
Having spent a few days in the village town of Katima Mulilo, yours truly was left somehow restless and completely in the blues after witnessing the accelerating decline of recreational facilities in the area while the few that are in existence look destined for stray dogs.
For starters, the only sports complex in the Zambezi Region, holed up in the vastly populated village town of Katima Mulilo, is certainly not fit enough to host high profile international, let alone regional or zonal competitions if the playing surface resembling a badly neglected garbage garden, is anything to go by.
Upon closer inspection, yours truly was shockingly informed that the field has not been watered over the last four months because there is apparently no water available, notwithstanding the fact that the seemingly bottomless Zambezi River flows freely approximately a mere 200-metres away from the stadium. I’m just wondering.
Katima is a buzzing enclave laden with piles of sports lovers and enthusiastic athletes but the obvious lack of facilities and interest from the local businesspeople to invest and plough back their profits into the very same community that serves them dearly, leaves a sting in the tail.
Well, I’m told business owners are always reluctant to roll up their sleeves and live up to their social responsibilities by parting with little moolah to assist the needy in their well-meant efforts to organise various sporting events of national interest.
It has also emerged that whenever sports events that usually attract those from the elite minority society take place, the popular Freshwater Angling, a case in point, local businesspeople would not have to shed a drop of sweat to join the fray and are ostensibly very quick out of the blocks to loosen their customarily tightened purse strings.
Consumers should make their voice heard and let those who control the purse strings of our economy know in no uncertain terms that they are not doing favours to customers by sponsoring sports and cultural events.
The bottom line is, these companies have a moral obligation towards those who sustain their operations. After all, an investment in any kind of a relationship must be reciprocated because people would respond to incentives by doing what is in their best interests. The corporate world must realise how quickly and radically people’s behaviour changes when genuine incentives come into play.
As it stands, it’s the same old worn out song that whenever companies are approached for donations, the answer would always be that they must first consult and get permission from their parent company in South Africa, clearly a cock and bull story.
Apart from a horde of insufficient facilities in the Zambezi Region, there appears to be a dire need from the relevant authorities to revisit and adjust their current operations.
And while one must commend the hard work and undying commitment by the Zambezi Senior Sports Officer, one Ben Lumbonyani, the brother is walking on a very tight rope and is caught between the devil and the deep sea since he does not have the necessary means to execute his designated functions, so to speak.
Sports authorities must put their ducks in the row and introduce reasonable development programmes. It is incumbent upon them to make it their sole province to appoint people with appropriate expertise and knowledge to monitor the successful implementation of these programmes. I rest my case.