Recently the National Assembly in its highly commendable growing tradition of recognizing excellence in the society invited the newly crowned CECAFA Kagame Castle Cup champions, Young Africans Sports Club in which members of the club were showered with all kinds of praises for the feat they had accomplished.
While there was nothing wrong in inviting the club to the august House.
However, there were certain utterances made by some members of parliament during the occasion that may have done an unirreparable damage to the national cohesion.
It would be recalled that when the then chairman in the House, Mr Job Ndugai, invited members of Young Africans in the House, one of the Mps queried the logic of inviting a team that had won the coveted trophy four times only.
He said Yanga’s arch-rivals, Simba, had won the trophy seven times, apart from being the inaugural winner of the tournament in 1973, yet the august House had never invited the team to the House.
It was not difficult to decipher what the Mp meant, that by doing what it had done, the parliament was engaging itself in selective treatment exercise.
Unfortunately for the poor Mp, his argument was brushed aside by Mr Ndugai who must however, be praised for publicly admitting his interests, that he was a Yanga fan.
But one could still fault him for being forgetful of the fact that as the House’s Deputy Speaker, it would have been prudent to hide his love/sentiments for the club by being seen to be somewhat impartial.
Interestingly, even the Speaker, Ms Anne Makinda, who had gone ‘missing’ in the House for a couple of days, finally emerged to partake in the group picture with the yellow-green shirted boys from Jangwani Street in Dar es Salaam.
The presence of the Speaker and other bigwigs during that auspicious occasion just went a long way toward showing the ‘political weight’ of the Dar es Salaam soccer club in Tanzania’s socio-political landscape.
The treatment of Yanga’s visit at the House arguably transcended sporting limits, with a section of the Mps politicizing the victory, something that should not be allowed in future.
For whatever arguments for and against either of the two clubs, it is important to bear in mind that the two soccer clubs are more than football clubs given the number of fans and followers they command in the country, hence the need to treat ‘the more than’ aspect cautiously.
We all know the sterling role played by the club during the independence struggle when it was used by the Tanganyika African National Union, TANU, in recruiting its members at the Jangwani playing fields.
A story is told on how Tanu recruiters would go around with cards during Yanga’s crowd packed training sessions and getting new members away from suspecting government agents.
While everybody appreciates the role played by the club, it is however, advisable for politicians to refrain from using either of the two clubs for their political ends.
As already noted, there is nothing wrong in inviting the club to the Parliament.
But such invitations ought to be handled with care or else they could end up giving rise to misunderstanding!
A peep into the past over the two clubs may help us in shading light on the importance of treating Simba and Yanga with utmost care.
During the 1970s, Simba came to be known as Sunderland and Young Africans were known by their current name.
But then the government issued a directive to the effect that Tanzanian clubs should not bear foreign, colonial names.
Following the directive, Sunderland became Simba and since then the club has continued to use the same name.
The only change that was forced on Yanga was when the club was told to drop the torch both from its flag and the club emblem so that it could not be confused with the then ruling party’s Tanu flag.
Because of Yanga’s association with Tanganyika’s independence struggle, their fans would now and then associate themselves with the government in power.
For instance, during 1970s, slogans such as Yanga Serikali, Yanga Bodi were often blurted out by fans whenever they had arguments with fans from their arch-rivals, Simba who also became known as abiju, a short from for Abidjan.
It would be recalled that later, in 1980s, whenever Yanga fans harped on the Yanga Serikali slogan, Simba came up with a slogan of their own about the club being Taifa Kubwa.
The Yanga Serikali slogan would later be buttressed (during conflict in the club that finally led to the split in 1975 giving rise to Pan African) by the government when it finally stepped in to help in solving the Yanga crisis, but failed miserably.
One of the most memorable developments during the time was the government’s decision to sack Yanga’s foreign Zairean coach, Tambwe Leya, allegedly for middling in the club’s affairs.
Interestingly, the government did not end there. It also served expulsion notice on Simba’s Guinean coach (Conakry), Nabi Camara.
The sending home of Camara by the government is one of the most baffling decisions in Tanzania’s soccer history because unlike Tambwe Leya, Camara was not involved in any conflict!
In fact, this was the time when Simba were playing their best football in history, thanks to their visionary Secretary General, David Jimmy Ngonya, who died in the city last week.
But because the Guinean coach was very good, Simba fans were quick to accuse the government of sabotaging their club.
However, their complaints reached nowhere on account of the fact that whatever the government did, it was always tactical, covering well its path.
Another selective action by the powers that be took the form of assistance when the founding father of the Zanzibar nation, Sheikh Abeid Amani Karume gave Young Africans 2m/- to assist them in building their club headquarters at Jangwani, in Dar es Salaam.
Later, as an after-thought, he extended 200,000/- to Yanga’s arch-rivals, Simba for the same cause, to help them towards construction of their club house.
Mzee Karume’s decision appears to have been aimed at stemming off grumbling by Simba fans who saw the action as selective.
Of course one could not pin down the Isles leader on the discrepancy because Mzee Karume had long been a member of Yanga which had close relations with its Zanzibar counterpart.
But let us also not forget that for historical reasons enumerated above, Mwalimu Nyerere was also closer to Yanga than Simba.
However, one of the top-flight leaders known to have been a member of Simba was former Vice President, Rashid Mfaume Kawawa (Simba wa vita).
Kawawa helped a great deal in bringing Simba, somewhat, into government’s fold and this act, to some extent, helped in making Simba fans and followers believe that they were not being ignored by their government.
Although Simba have like their arch-rivals been locked in numerous internal conflicts, they have however, not had the luxury of having their problems solved or attended to by the government of the day.
However, unlike Simba, Yanga have several times had conflicting sides summoned to the State House where their problems were settled amicably.
Yanga fans have also tended to associate their club to the ruling party, CCM and in fact nothing illustrates this more than the CCM chant the fans also resort to whenever the club wins an important tournament.
However, until the parliament incident a few weeks ago, past association of the club with the ruling party and the government tended to be taken lightly by Simba.
However, the Parliament incident in Dodoma a few weeks ago may have completely changed that by pushing the other side away into the political arms of other parties!
To what extent the feting out of Yanga by a section of members of parliament in Dodoma have had a political impact, only time will tell.
However, it is important for our Mps to bear in mind that times have changed considerably, hence the need to be very cautious in handling social groups lest we burn our fingers.Attilio Tagalile
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