The move by the Football Kenya Federation denied Bandari FC a chance to participate in the annual Mapinduzi Cup has been explained.
According to the club’s vice chairman, Twaha Mbarak in an interview with the Nation, the Federation felt that their participation in the tournament would disrupt the free flow of the league schedules.
“The federation has told us participating in the tournament will affect the smooth running of the league,” Mbarak said.
Mbarak wasn’t however pleased with the decision as he revealed that they could only miss a game and had already talked with their opponents (Nzoia Sugar FC) about it.
“But we had made arrangements. If we made it to the final (of the tournament), only one league assignment against Nzoia (Sugar) would have been affected. I’d reached out with a proposal on how to reschedule the match, and our opponents had no problem with that,” he added.
Bandari was one of the teams that had been invited and found themselves in Pool ‘C’ alongside football giants such as Yanga SC from Tanzania, KVZ from Zanzibar, and Vital’O from Burundi.
The Mapinduzi Cup, which has been a significant part of Zanzibar’s independence celebrations since its inception in 1998 with this year’s event scheduled to take place from December 28 to January 13 at Amaan Stadium, with Bandari FC placed.
