South Africa's basketball community

Mozambique High School program with all the bling of the West

By on August 30, 2008 in High School

From someone who is working with school kids what I saw in Mozambique was mind blowing. Development is the key to producing the most elite athletes. It all starts by having a vision and putting the right attitudes in the minds of the participants and communities. This initiative was started by two of Mozambique’s great sons. Mr. Antonio Azevedo who used to coach in Portugal and won championships with a bunch of unknown players who had immigrated to Portugal and Mr. Joao Domingues who played professional league in Portugal for Benfica. They both decided to come back to Mozambique and run a junior program for the federation. With that much knowledge and expertise of the game the program can only succeed.

The program involves high schools from Greater South of Mozambique. Schools participate in their regions to qualify for the actual league. The eight teams that qualify play a round robin format over four months. I was fortunate to be in Mozambique for the last weekend when the league was drawing to an end. The winner had already been decided and that day they had All Stars from the league playing.

moz high school_clip1

You could have sworn that Mozambique was playing South Africa inside by the streams of people waiting outside to watch. The last time I played in Maxaquene, we were playing for a spot in the African Champs in 2005 and the atmosphere was electrifying. The games were first hosted at Desportivo, a semi-indoor arena that seats about 1500 spectators but it soon got too small for the number of people that flocked to the venue. After that, games were moved to Maxaquene, an indoor stadium that seats 5000 people and for R15 a head – it is not that cheap for the ordinary school going Mozambican and yes you guess it right – the place is too small and lots of people still don’t get to watch the games. The organizers are now thinking of hosting the basketball games in a soccer field. This time Maxaquene was packed and about another thousand outside waiting to get a glimpse what was happening inside.

The tournament is supported by the Mozambique Basketball Federation and is sponsored by M-Cel (largest cellphone company in Mozambique), Sprite and S-TV. This program is called Basket Show and it has revolutionized youth sports in Mozambique. Basket Show incorporates live music performed by local musicians and newcomers and every school has a cheerleaders’ group that performs during and on game breaks.
There’s also a competition between these cheerleaders groups as well as the supporting crowds. The winner of the Basket Show wins R100 000 in cash and money that goes towards a project of the winning school (the last edition’s winner got their school computer room refurbished and equipped with new computers).

The games were televised live from 8:00 until 17:00. In addition to the games there was also entertainment surrounding the games.

The winning team from Matola received R100 000, I don’t know how much it is in Mozambican Maticais. While the league was running the cheerleader were also being graded and the winning cheerleaders would receive R20 000 and the winning dance group. There were performances from the local artists and the crowd went wild every time they hit the stage. All I could say was WOW. A country which is considered a third world country can invest so much in their basketball?

Basketball in Mozambique has huge support from the public, the government and the youth and what has made Basket Show a success is the fact that basketball was mixed with music, live performances but above all, the organization and the willingness of administrators to get basketball back where it belongs.

This is a great way to awaken a sleeping Mozambican giant, says my friend Naftal. Rest of Zone 6 watch out Mozambique is coming…

Article was done by Neo Mothiba edited by Victor Shakineza with some segments provided by Naftal Chongo






 


 

 

There’s also a competition between these cheerleaders groups as well as the supporting crowds. The winner of the Basket Show wins R100 000 in cash and money that goes towards a project of the winning school (the last edition’s winner got their school computer room refurbished and equipped with new computers).

The games were televised live from 8:00 until 17:00. In addition to the games there was also entertainment surrounding the games.

The winning team from Matola received R100 000, I don’t know how much it is in Mozambican Maticais. While the league was running the cheerleader were also being graded and the winning cheerleaders would receive R20 000 and the winning dance group. There were performances from the local artists and the crowd went wild every time they hit the stage. All I could say was WOW. A country which is considered a third world country can invest so much in their basketball?

Basketball in Mozambique has huge support from the public, the government and the youth and what has made Basket Show a success is the fact that basketball was mixed with music, live performances but above all, the organization and the willingness of administrators to get basketball back where it belongs.

This is a great way to awaken a sleeping Mozambican giant, says my friend Naftal. Rest of Zone 6 watch out Mozambique is coming…

Article was done by Neo Mothiba edited by Victor Shakineza with some segments provided by Naftal Chongo

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

Subscribe

If you enjoyed this article, subscribe now to receive more just like it.

There is 1 Brilliant Comment

Trackback URL | Comments RSS Feed

  1. baller says:

    as i said before, we can only learn from our neighbours to make our basketball bigger and better.

Top