Sports CS Echesa to pay amputee team Ksh.2.3M

Sports Cabinet Secretary Rashid Echesa met the Kenya amputee football team on Friday and promised to pay the squad their allowances by next week.

In a closed door meeting at the ministry’s headquarters in Nairobi, the CS promised to pay Ksh.2.3 million, allowances owed to them.

The team competed at the Amputee World Cup in Mexico, but their tribulations off the field have clearly stolen the limelight.

The Amputee football team has had a tumultuous month due to financial troubles and at one point their trip to Mexico for the world cup was in doubt.

The Ministry of Sports heard their pleas at the eleventh hour and paid Ksh.7. 5 million for their air tickets to South America.

During the World Cup, the squad even played in one of their games without the correct uniform.

“The Sonko uniform was borrowed from the Nairobi amputee football club so that we could use it as an option at the tournament,” said Polycarp Mboya- Treasurer, Kenya Amputee Federation.

But it was photos of the team as they slept in the Ministry of Sports board room on Thursday night, after failing to meet the CS, went viral on social media and got Kenyans talking.

“It had to be us to bring the report and the reception was not good. People had to sleep here,” said Dalmas Otieno, Player- Kenya Amputee.

Kenya finished 12th overall out of 24 teams and second in Africa behind the eventual winners Angola

“We have the professional players who we have called for national duty, they have also been promised that they were supposed to go back to Turkey and the Ministry of Sports is going to cater for the ticket,” said Mboya.