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"id": 586903,
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"content": "to gold itself and sold but he is yet to answer me. When these athletes win, it is Kenya’s name. Our flag is hoisted high and our National Anthem played in the stadium. World games are the most reputed games worldwide even more than Olympics. So, when somebody wins a gold medal in world games, he or she is deemed unbeatable in that particular event. We have Kenyans who won more gold medals than silver and bronze in the recently concluded World Championships. Each time they won a gold medal, the National Anthem was played. We, Kenyans, would be very happy to hear it because it was being played in China. The population of China is about 1.3 billion. Mathematics could not favour them to get a random sample of getting a single athlete to run any event and win a gold medal. It is only Kenya with a population of 40 million which can produce that number of medals. So, this is a wonderful team we are talking about. We should think about how to harness their prowess. Without it, our name in world sports is not there. They promote our name too much to a point where people forget the negative things in this country. When we have sports and we travel out there, we feel very proud. When the Kenyan team to the World Championship won, I was called by the Eritrean Ambassador to Kenya to congratulate me and the national team for having emerged top. I asked him why he was congratulating me and not himself. He replied that Eritrea had only one athlete who won gold. The day the athlete got to the country, it was declared a national holiday to celebrate his victory. That tells you that there are some countries which value what their sportsmen and women do there. On the contrary, for us, when our sportsmen and women come home, they are given some lunch. That is all. As some people say, we might not know the names of who won what. It is important for us to learn that when Kenyans win medals in various sports out there, we feel a sense of belonging which is a binding factor of nationalism. Whether it is a Kikuyu like David Ngugi, who won the marathon five times or Samuel Wanjiru, who after years of success died tragically, and many others who have been victorious over the years, we need to associate them with the Republic of Kenya because that is how we can talk of patriotism. When the volleyball team was in South America, coincidentally, I was in Chile. More puzzling is that fans cheered on their various national teams, even when it came third. When I told them I am Kenyan, and we were number one, they could not comprehend why we were not supporting our team. There is a feeling that Kenyans should attach themselves more to such teams that bring us glory that most countries do not get. During various championships, the Government should attach a lot of significance to these teams’ performances out there. When they come back home, they should be recognized as patriots for putting our name on the map. They make us earn more foreign exchange than the crops we sell because when other people know that we have great athletes, they will want to see what this country is like. Every Saturday in Iten, you will see people from all over the world in the high altitude areas because they think it will make them win gold medals out there. However, Kenyans have other styles of winning and will beat them even if they train together. What puzzles me is that once an athlete earns whatever they get, particularly the golden jackpot, which is about Kshs90 million, the manager gets 20 per cent of the total earnings while the Government will also tax the athlete about 20 per cent of the total earnings. So, in the end, the athlete takes home 50 to 60 per cent. This person will have done a lot of work, earned us a name, and we are asking the Government to control the role of managers and desist from taxing such athletes when they come back with pomp and glory. They take us very far in terms of standings in world champions and other games. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}