Spot for Sports: Why Kisumu Should be Kenya’s Sports Tourism City

Kisumu is an excellent spot for sports. It is home to various outdoor and indoor sporting activities, including football, rugby, basketball, netball, and golf.

The WRC got the Safari Rally back on its annual calendar three years ago after a 19-year absence from the Kenyan leg of the championship. The return of this event resulted from a multi-pronged charm offensive by the government, private sector businesses, and the motorsports leadership and lovers in the country.

A significant convergence of interest for this team of lobbyists was the Safari Rally’s appeal as a sports tourism event. Sports tourism is a massive niche sector of economies at whatever levels.

Kisumu’s potential.

So why is Kisumu, as a county, not so keen on this sub-sector?

God knows, and we all do. It has immense potential to be a magnetic sporting destination. This county’s talent in sports of all sorts is almost unmatched nationally. It’s also ideally located to serve the Nyanza and Western Kenya tourism circuit at the regional and national levels. Above all, it is the third largest city in the country and East Africa internationally due to its prime geographical placement.

Some sure-hit sporting activities/events can bring in domestic and international tourists with a raving taste for sporty adventures. With a concerted effort of private businesses, county and national government, and sports associations, the sports below will certainly bring in an extra coin or two to our city and county.

Watersports.

For instance, the city sits on the shores of the world’s second-largest freshwater lake, Nam Lolwe/Lake Victoria. Sports should thrive here with the new impetus on optimizing opportunities in/for Blue Economies. Water sports are exhilarating, highly adventurous, and refreshing athleisure activities. Kisumu should have jet skiing. A quick check on the internet will show you how alive jet skiing is on the Ugandan side of the lake; why are we sleeping on this?

Dunga, Usoma, and Nyanza Club are some of the sweet spots to station these. Windsurfing, speed boat races, and even scuba diving can do well too.

Sky Diving.

There is adequate airport space with the old and new airport taxiing ways. That is enough to host sports airplanes for skydiving around our beautiful county. What else do you need for an excellent skydiving adventure apart from taking off and landing ways, parking spaces for planes, and an excellent clear sky? We have it all. We need to have it running, and the daredevils and adrenaline fanatics will come jumping at the opportunity.

On another note, amphibious planes used to take off from the Kisumu airport and land or take off from the nearby lake. This can be a sport/adventure too.

Motorsport.

The introduction to this article was the Safari Rally. Now the Safari Rally is an international event. Still, the same factors apply and can be devolved to our county and used as a template to curate a Kisumu Rally that’s packaged so well that it gets a good fun vibe.

As a kid growing up in Kisumu, I remember how electric motorsports was on this side of the country. 

During those long-gone years, the sporty event was so big it took real effort to secure the starting and finishing points at the Simba club from mammoth crowds.

The fast, flashy cars would zoom past as they headed for the hills or the sugarcane farms, with excitable fans dotting the routes. Why can’t this be back?

Rugby.

You already know what happens when Dala Sevens is in town. It may have gone a notch lower after COVID, but man, the event is always a slammer! Imagine it’s a national clubs league event. What if the national teams, both 7s and 15s, were to, from time to time, hold their matches here? It comes with the colorful and bold rugby culture and its coterie of fans from all over East Africa.

Football.

As an avid Gor Mahia Fc fan, I have first-hand experience with how businesses in this city recorded sales whenever Gor Mahia played here between 2014 and 2018. It was so profitable that, at some point, the national football federation banned league matches from being played in our stadium for lack of a perimeter fence. However, business owners chipped in and had the fence back up to have Kogalo play.

This can be brought back bigger. With standard facilities, regional, national, and continental matches can be hosted here. The Mashemeji Derby can be played here.

Cultural Games.

Ajua, Amen (wrestling), Ywayo Tol (tug of war) Piem Yiedhi (boat racing/regatta)s need recalibration and mainstreaming and marked as our unique indigenous sporting experience.

Indoor/Board Sports.

There is a fantastic community of chess players in Kisumu who grace events across this region. Chess, Scrabble, Darts, Billiards, and other sports have the potential to market Kisumu globally. Likewise, Basketball, with a standard indoor arena, is a crowd/tourists puller. 

Swimming.

Do we have Olympic size standard swimming pools? Pools that can host at least school championships? Who wouldn’t love to swim competitively under our glorious sunny days? Somebody tag the county government to give us an answer. 

Golf Spot.

With a golf course ashore – extending to the very edge of the majestic Lake Victoria, the Nyanza Club, a private members club offering Golf, Swimming, Tennis, Squash, and other sports facilities to its members and guests, has the key to unlocking this potential in the region.

Sports Ambassadors.

Lastly, make sports people brand ambassadors for Kisumu’s brand-building sporty touch. From Conjestina Achieng, Peter Dawo, and Andrew Amonde, among many other sports heroes/heroines from Kisumu and the region. Kisumu government  should tap into their networks and have them represent the region as leading lights of sports prowess.