The Kenya women basketball team. [Photo/kenyapage.net]
The Kenya women basketball is slated to compete in the afro-basketball championships after a meeting with sports ministry officials ended successfully.
Kenya basketball treasurer, Peter Orero, confirmed that the sports ministry officials were open to sponsoring the women’s team and would commit in two weeks time.
This comes after Fiba Africa Representative, Julian Farran, demanded that Kenya fields her foreign based basketball players in order to be given a wild card.
The wild card is only available for group A which hosts Angola, Mali, Tunisia, Cameroon and Cote di'voire.
The championships which are slated for September has two groups. Group B consists of Nigeria,Egypt,Mozambique,Guinea and other zone four teams.
Farran believes that Kenya has enough time to bring together a formidable team comprising of foreign based and local players. This was one of the conditions that Kenya had to meet to get a wild card to enable her team to compete in the September Bamako games.
The sponsorship deal includes calling up foreign based players to compete on behalf of the country in the afro basketball championships. Officials believe that the foreign based players will increase the chances of winning the championship. All eyes are on the sports ministry on whether they will keep their end of the deal and release the funds in good time.