Kenyan officials accompanying schools to the Federation of East Africa Secondary Schools Sports Associations (FEASSSA) in Rwanda have come under the spotlight after being accused of neglecting their duties and abandoning their respective teams.

The tournament, which kicked off last Saturday and is set to end on August 27 in Huye, Rwanda, has attracted 10 schools from various East African countries vying for football supremacy.

Among the Kenyan schools taking part in football are St Anthony Kitale, who earned their spot after a stunning victory in the Kenya Secondary School Games, where they triumphed over their rivals, Dagoretti High, with a resounding 2-0 result. By virtue of finishing second, Dagoreti are also taking part alongside Shanderema High School from the Western region.

However, reports from Rwanda have emerged officials in charge of the teams have neglected their duties and –apparently – are on “holiday.”

“Kenyan national officials in School games happening in Rwanda are a big letdown. These officials it is like they came for a holiday in Rwanda,” said Eric Lunga’ho of Shanderema on his social media pages.

He continued, “They (officials) are nowhere to be seen when the schools are playing. You can imagine a team getting on the pitch with no provision of water. In our match with Amus College of Uganda, there was no doctor to attend to our injured players. Imagine a national official asking a student in which field their game will be played.

This is the responsibility of the officials to guide the teams. I have seen some Kenyan government vehicles parked in odd places when they should be attending to the welfare of the Kenyan teams.

The coaches of the teams are also getting a raw deal from the same officials.”

He further explained how Shanderema players were forced to walk from the match venue to their residential rooms because the driver, who was assigned to them, had disappeared not to be seen after the game.

“Shanderema had to walk back to where they are staying after the driver of the bus allocated to them (Langata School) disappeared and left them stranded after their games with Amus College.”

St Anthony, who have two points from their opening matches, will next face CGFK of Rwanda today. In addition, Shanderema will come up against Amus College School of Uganda and Dagoretti High battle Ecose Musambira from Rwanda.