Football in many African countries is almost as ubiquitous a phenomenon as cricket is in India. The influence of football is so pervasive in Africa that terms like “is a goal” has layers of meaning that are extraneous to football.
The impact of football is felt across many spheres of life on the continent, ranging from the domestic to the political and even cultural. It is this author’s opinion that the wide popularly football enjoys on the continent has not been properly and productively harnessed for socio-economic development on the continent.
According to worldometers.info the African population stands at over 1.3 billion (May 2020) and UNESCO data states that 70% of this population is below the age of 30. That statistic is startling when placed side by side with the woeful economic performance of most African countries, considering the availability of resources and such an enormous potential workforce. It is not hard to imagine that a deficient education sector and the dearth of human resource development infrastructure could be one of the factors responsible for this disconnect.
The almost unbridled passion that characterizes the beautiful game can be strategically employed to enhance learning and the love of learning in a way that will greatly improve the education sector in particular and human capital development in general.
The UNHCR recognizes play as a fundamental right of every child and play has been scientifically verified to be a catalyst for cognitive development. Beyond childhood, even adults have been shown to benefit from play in the process of learning and the keen interest the young African population has in football can be leveraged to achieve educational goals for the youth.
A very good example of how exposure to football can enhance a person’s general knowledge and intellectual horizon is the case of the young Nigerian man, who from all appearances may not be well-travelled became a viral internet sensation after a video in which he is seen and heard delivering a mock match commentary in a near-perfect European accent was released. It is not unusual for an unlettered Real Madrid fan living in Togo to know that Madrid is the capital of Spain. Yours sincerely vividly remembers a non-literate fan of Manchester United who would dutifully come to the local cyber-cafe and buy airtime so the cafe attendants would open the club website and other sites featuring Manchester United news and read the details to him.
It is evident that football presents an opportunity to enlighten and educate the youth of Africa, and it is imperative for authorities across the continent to creatively leverage the popularity of football to develop human resource capacity.
Tochukwu Onwuzulike
