23-Apr-2012
Role of Sports
In
Nation Building
Aamir Bilal
1.8 billion People across the length and breath of Pakistan went buzzard when the entire nation celebrated the England triumph in Abu Dhabi test. The happiness was evident from the morose faces of Pakistanis, who at least for the moment forgot the dearth of natural gas, shortage of electricity and perplexity of memo scandal in the country.
The Cricket victory brought the much awaited happiness, relief and joy for the countrymen, thus testifying the statement of King of Bhutan who said that “gross national happiness is more important than gross national product and therefore happiness takes precedence over economic prosperity in worst of financial crises”.
Nation building is indeed a complex phenomenon and the tool of sport alone is not enough to execute this mammoth task, but sociologists agree that sport is one of the most potent human activities in its capacity to give meaning to life, to create and interconnect senses of achievement and identity. Above all, sport has a complex and important interaction with nationality and the phenomenon of nationalism.
Pakistan’s leadership has to realize that sport is a gold mine of occupational skills to access the labour market as one of the very unique assets in the present global economy for a human intensive country like Pakistan. An athlete or a sports person, apart from being a globetrotter, may acquire through its sport career, basic competences and skills such as fair play, self esteem, honesty, trust and leadership, but also those specific to a job such as sensitivity to diversity, client awareness, generating synergies, team building and taking care of people around him.
Unlike our leadership that renders no hope for its young generation because of there incompetence and myopic vision, H.E. Pierre Nkurunziza the president of the Republic of Burundi affirmed that “In recent years, sport has become a truly unifying element in my country and we have made initiatives to make sport a tool of nation building thus strengthening social cohesion and peace in Burundi.”
In the post- Colonialism and Development phase spanning from 1940 to 1990s sport was a highly contested field. For instance, in the Caribbean, cricket served to dramatize struggles of liberation, notably through victories over England. Following independence, the new elites in many “Third World” nations were integrated into the global governance of major sports. FIFA grew from 54 to 149 in the same period and sport governing bodies prioritized the global development of sport, which mirrored the modernization policies favoured by international bodies like the IMF and World Bank.
When we look into our sports and leadership perspectives we observe noting but shock waves, and our inability to cash upon various opportunities available to use sport as a tool of development, peace and nation building with the help of international stake holders like UN, EU, UNESCO, UNICEF and UNHCR.
The sport sociologists have conducted scientific studies in many developing countries to prove the premise that sport plays a pivotal roll in social and economic vitality of any nation. Three markets, namely, sports activities, sports equipment, and sports events- interact to set the wheels in motion for an economic development which cannot be ignored and which creates a growing economic sector. Sport has become not only a consumer good, but consumes goods itself. It generates economic wealth and jobs, and at the same time brings health and educational benefits to those who practice it.
During an important presentation on national sports policy given by Brig (Retd) Arif Sadeequi the ex DG PSB, the DG made a mention of sports as a tool of nation building to then President Gen (Retd) Perveez Musharaf, but the visionary president like most of the dictators bull dozed the very idea, because sport was too little a tool in his envisaged larger picture of nation building, which he hardly executed, except day to day fire fighting in his eleven years of unlawful reign.
The situation with the present government of Punjab is also not different. The government of Punjab is trying to construct play grounds at various places which were held by land mafia, within and around the vicinity of historic city of Lahore. This is indeed a good omen. However this healthy step is likely to meet with unhealthy outcomes like Punjab health or education sector reforms, because its entire focus is activity oriented, managed by untrained staff, that lacks capacity to run sports development and sport for society building programs for youth. Unfortunately the approach and understanding of sports for development and nation building with government of Punjab is very similar to many others in the country, who link sports development with infrastructure development only.
African countries offer a great learning opportunity to us, especially in the Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Lesotho, Mozambique and the Olympafrica Foundation, which is financed by the International Olympic Committee and Daimler Chrystler, has built simple sporting facilities and installed basic equipment to promote sports activities particularly in track and field.
For about twenty years now, international sporting federations such as FIBA, FIFA and FIVB have financed the construction of playing fields and have donated equipment worth millions of dollars. While their number one goal is to promote their own sport, these international federation projects have had significant economic returns in the countries where assistance has been provided.
How much forthcoming had been our sports bodies in enchasing upon such opportunities is evident from the fact that most of them are unable to write a proper letter of assistance to concerned stake holders. The ministry of sports, the POA and PSB instead of dreaming of staging SAAF or Asian games in Pakistan, should first put their house in order and learn from Balkans, Ruanda, Palestine, Jordan, Congo, Tanzania and South Africa of using sports for nation building and achieving development objectives.
Sport for Nation building programs are highly specialized, and if left to incompetent and untrained staff, than the results could be as catastrophic as it happened during football match in the Egyptian city of Port Said, where more than 70 people lost their precious lives due to concussion and stabbing.
Our myopic leaderships must come out from the cozy VIP lounge environment of cricket mindset with “Sport-Plus” approach in which the sport intervention is seen as the primary agent that is supposed to lead benefits to the participants to the “Plus-Sport” approach which instead involves activities that are integrated into a broader development program; in this vision of using sports for nation building, it is not only the value of sport itself that is supposed to bring about positive changes, but sport is seen as an instrument that, in parallel with other assistance initiatives, can contribute to the national development objectives.
Successive governments in Pakistan have failed to capitalize on sport for all and development aspect of sport which is mandatory to create a solid foundation of sports culture in the country. Zenith in competitive sport at international level is not possible without investment in sport for all initiatives at club and school level.
It is therefore imperative that sport related interventions be introduced in good faith and in detail, and not as a mere medium of “soft power” that enables external or sectional interests to secure control over populations.
People of Pakistan are eagerly looking forward to a change after early elections at macro level and so should be one at micro level after the POA elections. Will some one take the pain of publishing a white paper on sports activities in Pakistan, as done earlier by South Africa in 1990s and than form a holistic sport policy that should not only strive to produce athletes of international repute but a nation that adore sport as away of life.
Aamir Bilal
02 Feb 2012
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