For quite some time now, I have been very vocal in championing sports videography, or simply put, the broadcasting of major sporting events to Ugandan citizens by all national sports federations and associations, as well as other multi-sport bodies such as those in charge of primary, secondary and university sports.
These bodies are the Uganda Primary School Sports Association (UPSSA), the Uganda Secondary School Sports Association (USSSA), and the Association of Uganda University Sports (AUUS).
It is now nearly becoming the norm for many of these sports bodies not to broadcast their major games to Ugandan citizens.
Those that attempt to do so often provide very poor-quality coverage. From putting the patriotism of Ugandans in doubt to indirectly facilitating massive capital outflows, the failure of Ugandan sports videography is a far more serious problem than many people realise.
I have stated before that since all the above sports bodies use taxpayers’ money to organise their games, those taxpayers have a right to watch the events that their money pays for. I do not see how anyone can part with their hard-earned money to fund major sporting events and then find it difficult to watch and enjoy those games simply because the organisers do not care to broadcast them.
I have previously warned that there is some degree of illegality in failing to show taxpayers the games their money finances, and this could easily lead to court cases.
Furthermore, some of us have recently been unhappy with the excessive celebrations by Ugandans following Arsenal’s recent English Premier League title victory. To be fair, after a whopping 22-year wait for the trophy, Arsenal fans can hardly be blamed for celebrating enthusiastically. More worrying, however, is another reason many of our fellow citizens gave for their love of foreign sports, particularly football, over local sports.
On almost every forum where I engaged in discussions about this Arsenal matter, the main complaint from respondents was that even when they want to support local sports, they are nowhere to be seen. Many people have no idea when major local games are being played, have very little information about the teams and players involved, and often find the quality of the few local games they manage to watch extremely poor and demotivating. After becoming accustomed to the quality of English Premier League broadcasts, it can be very difficult to adjust to watching local sports coverage that is several times worse.
Given the shortcomings in scheduling, publicity and video quality, one can only blame our fellow citizens so much for appearing to support foreign sports more than local sports. If local sports are not even on television, how can we expect Ugandans to support them? With a population of 45 million people, television remains one of the most effective ways of putting sporting activities in front of the public. It is therefore disturbing that many organisers of major sporting events continue to overlook this very important aspect.
This narrative largely absolves Ugandans of any lack of patriotism and instead places the burden on sports event organisers who perform poorly when it comes to videography. By leaving Ugandans with little choice but to watch foreign sports, local sporting event organisers also contribute to significant capital outflows from our economy. Ugandans consume foreign sports through pay-TV platforms such as DSTV and StarTimes.
These pay-TV companies, in turn, send substantial amounts of money to foreign entities from whom they acquire sports content for resale to Ugandan audiences. This creates a threat to our local economy, particularly because very few people outside Uganda pay to watch our local sports. The result is a trade imbalance that benefits foreign entities more than Uganda in terms of sports-related commerce.
The combination of seemingly diminished patriotism and the drain on our economy through a sports trade imbalance should make all sports leaders carefully reconsider the impact of failed sports videography on our country. To appreciate just how serious this matter is, consider the recent school holiday period. While children were at home watching high-quality English Premier League broadcasts on television, their peers were competing in the National Secondary Schools Games in Mukono and Lira.
Many of these children could not watch the school games because most of them were not televised, and the few that were broadcast featured very poor-quality footage. This means that the failure of local sports videography is contributing to a generation of Ugandan children growing up with a stronger attachment to foreign sports than local sports. It also reinforces the perception that only foreign sports deserve television coverage, while local sports can only be followed through short television news highlights, radio reports or newspaper coverage.
This cycle continues to shape generations of both adults and children to the detriment of local sports development. Consuming foreign sports is not inherently bad, but the relationship cannot remain a one-way street in which only foreign sports benefit and grow. There are many factors contributing to this problem, but the primary failure lies with sports leaders who continue to grossly underestimate the importance of sports videography in our own country.
The writer is a Bush Lawyer, former President of the Uganda Table Tennis Association (UTTA), Secretary General of the Union of Uganda Sports Federations and Associations (UUSFA), and a Board Member of the Uganda Olympic Committee (UOC).
