KSSSA caps number of foreign players in school teams

New rules by the Kenya Secondary Schools Sports Association (KSSSA) restrict Kenyan international schools from fielding more than three foreign players during their competitions.

The move that is aimed at giving Kenyan youth an opportunity to showcase their talent has restricted the number of foreign students to three per discipline.

According to KSSSA member Twaha Mwatsahu, the association has to bowed down to pressure from sponsors who were not happy about the high number of foreigners mostly from South Sudan, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda in basketball and rugby games in particular. Investigations have shown that a huge number of these foreigners are not even students.

“KSSSA came up with strict rules to govern the school games, among them age limit and six-year rule for one to be legible to play at the school games. Most schools could not manage with the local players whose details could be readily available at the Kenya National Examination Council (KNEC) or the Registrar of Persons locally and this prompted the schools who were hell bent to win to recruit foreign students”, Mwatsahu said.

Mwatsahu, who is also the Coast Secondary Secondary Sports Association treasurer and Principal of Ngomeni Secondary in Malindi, went ahead to give examples of St George’s High School Kilifi and Laiser Hill who were banned for fielding Tanzania University students three years ago. The bans have since been lifted.

He has also advised schools that give scholarships to foreign students to consider Kenyans too arguing that the locals need it more rather than foreign students who disappear soon after the games.

“Our investigations have revealed that most of this foreign students who join some of our schools specifically for basketball and rugby disappear immediately after the championships are over which makes us believe that they are never students in the first place”, he said.

Last year’s championship games saw schools like Laiser Hill, Upper Hill School and Kapenguria Boys field a huge number of foreigners with some teams having only one Kenyan student in their list.

The move is aimed at improving local sports while it emulates rules by bigger sports governing bodies like Confederation of African Football (CAF) and Federation of International Basketball Association (Fiba). FIBA allows only two foreigners per club in their tournaments while CAF allows a maximum of five foreigners per club in its club competitions.