Last Sunday was a fantastic day in Kenya’s football playbook, and so will the coming Sunday. Kenya’s two great football clubs, Gor Mahia and AFC Leopards, met last Sunday and will meet again at Nyayo National Stadium.

Last Sunday, AFC Leopards hosted their perennial rivals Gor Mahia for their first-leg League match. This coming Sunday, Gor Mahia will return the favour.

This Mashemeji Derby is a coming-out day for the two teams’ fans. Dance, music, and community pride are at stake, culminating in eating, drinking, and annual boasting rights.

Too often, the fans of both clubs become rowdy, which can sometimes lead to ugly scenes of violence. But that does not diminish the derby’s other aspect – the economic rewards to be gained from it.

Those fans do not go to the stadium on an empty stomach; they do not stay there hungry or rush home after the match. Through it all, it is punctuated with purchasing food, drinks, and sports memorabilia.

The post-match analysis sessions could run late into the evening, boosting economic activity. Given the derby’s economic benefit, the skirmishes between the two fans is a small price to pay.

Football is Kenya’s main sports crowd-puller. The game is more than just 22 young men and a middleman running around the field for 90 minutes chasing a ball. It is a coming-out day, a moment of retreat from the busy week’s activity, a time of forgetfulness and embrace of a community’s warmth.

Gor Mahia fans will tell you that supporting the team is not a choice but a community duty, indeed a calling. Gor fans tend to use more colourful language. The feeling is mutual among AFC Leopards fans.

It is common to find fans from both sides cheering and dancing together on their way to or from the game and sometimes even within the stadium. After all, what is a game without the fans from the other side? Indeed, what is football in Kenya without AFC Leopards and Gor Mahia?

Yet, the country fails to understand this moment. Most parts of Kenya focus on noise and fail to appreciate the art, seamlessly blending into one of the country’s most beautiful moments.

It is unclear why the government does not capitalise on this great potential or even demonstrate that it understands. Today, you may struggle to recall the Cabinet secretary under whose docket sports is domiciled. Salim Mvurya he is. Before him was Kipchumba Murkomen. It is as if either of the men does not understand greatness.

The national broadcaster KBC, now led by the colourful William Kabogo, proceeded with its programme schedule as if unaware that greatness was playing out in town. The Mashemeji Derby in Kenya is not just another game; it is the defining game of the Kenyan football calendar. Even our neighbours understand that.

In Tanzania, that other crazy footballing nation in the region relayed live the game from Nairobi to their fans in Tanzania. Just imagine, Tanzanians understand that the teams to stop the clock for in Kenya are the two in-laws. You should be in Dar es Salaam or anywhere in Tanzania when Simba, Yanga or Azam are playing. Nobody will turn to the English Premier League. It is the stuff of patriotism – and it is nurtured.

That is where KBC comes in. Media is important in harnessing and channelling feelings into a cause – a national pride. It is a moment of distracting the country from its challenges to a period of forgetfulness and escape into the beauty of art and science combined – for that is what football is. The delight of wiggling the body between opponents and crossing the ball precisely to deliver a goal.

So KBC must wake up from its slumber before Sunday and take up its national duty to bring the most significant fan moment in Kenya into people’s homes. It can’t be a matter of budget. Gor fans will tell you Pesa otas! Football is very important for the nation. It is KBC’s national responsibility.

— The writer is the Dean of Daystar University’s School of Communication