It is the dream of many youths in Elgeyo Marakwet – nicknamed Home of Champions – to follow in the footsteps of many world beaters the county has produces with regularity.

The champions inspire the youth to live the athletics dream of not only conquering the world but also running away from poverty to flashy lifestyles. They crave celebrity life.

However, while many of the youngsters have the potential to achieve the dream and do even better, their dream is snuffed out by their coaches and managers who start exploiting them – out of ignorance – at a very young age and for lack of exposure.

According to Secretary of County Secondary School Sports Association Christopher Sitienei, whenever there is a secondary school sports completion, among the many who turn up to cheer the young athletes are coaches whose main target is to identify talents.

“Being coaches, they are well placed to identify young athletes who have the potential to be world champions,” he said.

Once identified, Sitienei said, the coaches approach the young athletes without involving their teachers or parents and lure them by promising to train them to become great athletes. The coaches, he added, go as far as their homes where they rope in ignorant parents to make the deal appear genuine.

“Being young and vulnerable, the minors agree to signing contracts that they don’t even understand in the hope of becoming rich,” Sitienei who is also a coach and a teacher at St Peter’s Iten Secondary School said.

The secretary cited the case of a boy who was in form two who was poached by a coach and taken to Japan to participate in road races all these without the school’s knowledge. He said that after being lured into signing the contracts, their teachers who have been coaching them all along suddenly become enemies with the minors even refusing to talk to them.

“The coaches exploit their innocence and vulnerability and poison their minds against their teachers as they don’t want them to be around to guide them,” Sitienei said.

He added that for those who come back to school they become rude and less interested in education after being introduced into money when they are still young which in turn affects their education. Others, he said, are conned and do not receive any money.

“It’s quite sad to see them come back to school, where they are unable to clear school fees because the money they earn is stolen by their coach or managers because they don’t understand the contract they sign,” he explained.

He was speaking during a meeting convened by the Centre for Enhancing Democracy and Good Governance (CEDGG) that was sponsored by UNFPA to equip coaches, athletes’ managers and duty bearers with tools and knowledge on how to detect, prevent and respond to sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment in sports.

The teacher also called on training camps that house students during school holidays not to mix young girls with senior athletes, saying most of them are lured by the senior athletes who sexually take advantage of them. Some are even impregnated.

Sitienei called on the government to put in place measures which ensure smooth transition from secondary school to junior athletes and eventually senior athletes, which will ensure that apart from running, they also acquire education to enable them to manage their lives when they retire from sports.

He said others seek sponsorship in the hope that once they get proper training they can move abroad where they will study as they run. He, however, said only a few make it with many others leaving the camps after two or more years with nothing.

The secretary also expressed concern over foreigners who shoot documentaries of the minors and send them abroad saying they do not even know what happens to the documentaries and how the benefits if any.

Prof Byron Kipchumba, a coach and camp manager, called for the strengthening and equipping of teachers with necessary skills to enable them to coach and train young learners under the CBC system with ministry of education ensuring that children remain in schools.

“It is sad to hear that our children are taken abroad to run races they are not supposed to under dubious contracts because if they get hurt, they are abandoned as the contracts they sign don’t protect them,” he said.

Prof Kipchumba said education should be prioritised alongside talents saying apart from helping the athletes manage their income it also comes in handy in case the athlete is unable to run he will have an alternative source of income.

County Sports Director Patrick Wabende said minors are not allowed to participate in road races and marathon as they are still too young as such races burn them out before they realise their dream.

The director regretted that such moves deny the country future athletes while also destroying the lives of the minors. Such cases should be prosecuted in court as exploitation, he recommended.

He added that the county will soon be implementing the sports act which will ensure that only coaches with the necessary certificates are allowed to operate saying this will enable the government weed out coaches and managers exploiting athletes.

Paul Masese from CEDGG appealed to training camps to incorporate the Standard Operating Procedures (Sop) for the detection, prevention and response to sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment in their operations. This, he said, will be an assurance to athletes of their safety, dignity and justice.

• A Tell Media / KNA report / By Alice Wanjiru