Why Fufa needs to take the lead in grassroots football development

At the moment, the Fufa executive is conducting a countrywide tour of the eight regional football associations to get to grips with the challenges, respond to issues and plan a way forward to developing grassroots football.

Conspicuous in all this this is the element of escapism, an inclination to retreat from unpleasant realities through diversion or fantasy.

In reality, what Fufa is actually providing is lip service to a dire situation that needs a pragmatic approach. For instance, as the game needs to be taken to the grassroots, we need to have as many stadiums/pitches as possible countrywide.

It is not an easy job and it requires Fufa to work with various government and NGOs to make this a reality. Unfortunately, over the past decade, Fufa is yet to convince anyone to work on upgrading a national stadium. Bugembe continues to lie in ruins after years of neglect.

Yet amidst all this, Fufa continues to place European stadium standards on Ugandan football as though we have the capacity to do so. Yet, what we need is a pragmatic federation able to work with local government institutions to develop the game using the bottom-up approach.

The easiest scenario is having Fufa team up with local government to construct stadiums countryside. World over, today’s stadiums have to be multi-purpose, not for football alone and this calls for the involvement of private stakeholders only in order to acquire the basic equipment such as a grader, 12-tonne roller, transcavator and water bowser, among others.

If Fufa, with backing from government can acquire these machines, the whole of Uganda would be assured of football pitches. With these machines, it takes just a week to complete works on a stadium construction in partnership and collaboration with various district authorities.

All Fufa needs to provide is the technical expertise and specifications and leave the rest to the districts to fund works. Of Uganda’s 136 districts, it would take just about two years before Fufa has a stadium in every region of the country.

The author is SC Villa president emeritus