Wanga: Kakamega Homeboyz striker proposes radical changes to KPL management

Former Harambee Stars striker Allan Wanga has proposed radical changes on how football should be run in Kenya.

The Kakamega Homeboyz striker has pleaded with the Football Kenya Federation (FKF) to engage with the county governments as he believes this is the only way the game can see meaningful development.

“It is high time the federation started thinking of how to engage the government to enhance and put more emphasis on sports development across the country,” Wanga said in a post on his Facebook page.

“By this I mean devolve sports and allow the counties to come up with structural plans of stadia facilities and develop all sports from grassroots levels.”

One of the critical proposals the former AFC Leopards striker has suggested is to have the county governments to own a club, come up with a tournament and the top 20 teams should be allowed to form the top league essentially replacing the current Kenyan Premier League (KPL).

“The long-term vision should focus on having a tournament to run with fixtures of all the 47 counties included, the first 20 to form the Premiership and the next 20 to form the [National] Super League,” Wanga explained.

“Put in place a mechanism to ensure counties consume the existing top-flight teams and offer direct sponsorship to cater to the players' welfares and wellbeing in terms of salaries medication and insurance all-inclusive.

“This in return will open up a wide platform for the exploration of untapped talent across the country.”

The forward further revealed the importance of developing football as opposed to how the current system runs.

“The competitiveness will gain more value and with the support from the counties teams will develop structures of all levels and academies will become relevant too,” he said.

“Jobs for the youths will emerge and clubs will cease to be ethnic and instead be derived from a county point of perspective.

“If well planned, this could move the country to another level on matters sports and allow the massive unutilized potential in the industry to be turned into a meaningful entity.

“By bringing together like-minded people a lot can be done for the love of our country and everyone will feel involved in one way or another.”

Wanga's suggestions come as clubs battle a tough financial crisis and the league is running without a title sponsor.