A Nation that forgot its own daughters: The Sunday read you didn’t know you needed

DAR ES SALAAM: GOOD morning, dear reader, and welcome to another Sunday, which, as tradition now demands in this beloved country of ours, must begin with either a hangover or a WhatsApp forward you have already seen four times.

Or, in this particular week, both at once.

Kindly pour your tea, sit comfortably and let us walk through the events of the past fortnight together, because frankly somebody needs to explain what on earth just happened.

Let us start where the whole country’s attention actually was, because pretending otherwise would be dishonest.

Simba Day and Yanga Day arrived back-to-back, and for forty-eight straight hours, Tanzania transformed itself into two rival kingdoms.

Streets turned red. Streets turned green and yellow.

Lorries were decorated like wedding cars. Grown men who have not sung since primary school choir suddenly rediscovered their voices, chanting club anthems at full volume outside supermarkets.

Somewhere, a boda-boda rider tied a club flag to his motorcycle so large that it is frankly a miracle he did not take off like a kite.

This, dear reader, is who we are. We do not do things by halves.

When Tanzania loves a football club, Tanzania does not simply support it… Tanzania marries it, has children with it and names the children after strikers.

And now, hot on the heels of all that noise, comes the Ngao ya Hisani, the Community Shield on August 12 at the New Amaan Stadium in Zanzibar, kicking off the new football season in style.

Simba and Yanga will meet under new management on both sides: Yanga have brought in Manqoba Mngqithi fresh from his long reign at Mamelodi Sundowns, while Simba have answered with Steve Barker, last seen marshalling Stellenbosch.

Two serious football minds, two proud clubs, one island, one very hot evening ahead.

Add to this the small matter of a new Yanga striker by the name of Peter Shalulile, who has apparently been receiving friendly warnings from every teammate and acquaintance he has ever had in Tanzanian football.

All telling the Namibiaborn striker the same thing: Nothing, nothing prepares you for a Kariakoo Derby.

So yes. The excitement is earned. The country has every right to be loud about this one.

But now, dear reader, we must turn the page quietly, respectfully, because this next part deserves it.

While all of the above was unfolding, our Twiga Stars, the women’s national football team, were on the other side of the continent, in Casablanca, Morocco.

They were fighting for something considerably rarer than a derby trophy: A shot at qualifying through to the knockout stages of the WAFCON, and with it, a flicker of a chance at reaching the Women’s World Cup.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Not a derby. Not a Community Shield. A World Cup dream, the kind of opportunity that, for a footballing nation like ours, does not knock every year, or even every decade.

And here is the part that should make every one of us slightly ashamed.

Our Twiga Stars daughters had already made history before that final match. They beat South Africa, beat them for the very first time ever at a WAFCON tournament.

They scored in every single match they played in the entire competition, a run of consistency that our men’s national team has not always managed.

This was not a team making up the numbers. This was a team writing history in real time.

Then came the final group match against Ivory Coast, needing only a win to progress.

The Ivorians, returning to WAFCON for the first time in twelve years, scored through Nsira Ouedraogo just before half-time, then doubled their lead through an Ines Konan penalty in the second half.

Diana Msewa pulled one back for Tanzania deep into stoppage time, a proud, defiant goal that arrived, sadly, far too late to change the outcome.

Final score: 2-1 to Ivory Coast. Tanzania’s tournament, and with it a genuine sliver of World Cup hope, ended there.

And here is the truth, dear reader: Most of the country did not notice!

While our ladies were battling in Casablanca, the rest of us were comparing whose derby fan bus had the loudest sound system.

Or debating whether a new striker “has the legs,” and generally behaving as though the only football worth discussing wears red or green.

Now, before anyone accuses yours truly of trying to spoil derby week, relax, relax!

Nobody is asking you to skip the Shield. Watch it. Enjoy it. Shout until your voice goes, same as everybody else. This is not an either-or conversation.

What this apology of a columnist is asking, gently but firmly, is this: Is it too much to expect that a nation capable of organising two full days of celebration for a club rivalry could also spare a headline, a radio mention, a single trending hashtag, for eleven ladies who came within one victory of doing something no Tanzanian football team, men’s or women’s has done in living memory?

Consider the numbers for a moment.

Simba Day and Yanga Day: Two days, national holiday atmosphere, wall-to-wall coverage, endless analysis.

Twiga Stars beating South Africa for the first time in history, then narrowly missing out on a World Cup pathway: Barely a ripple.

If fairness were measured in football, this scoreline would be considered a scandal.

The good news, dear reader, is that football does not stand still and neither should our attention.

The Community Shield kicks off the season on this coming Wednesday, August 12, in Zanzibar.

Both Simba and Yanga then open their league campaigns away from home in mid-August, before the first true Kariakoo Derby of the season arrives on October 10 at Uhuru Stadium.

I am told the return fixture is set for early February.

Plenty of derby drama still to come and yours truly will be right there with you for every bit of it.

But let this also be the season we do better by our daughters on the pitch.

Let us learn the names of our Twiga Stars as easily as we know every reserve fullback keeping the bench warm at Bunju Complex.

Let us watch their next match from kick-off, not just when they happen to beat somebody famous.

Because a World Cup dream, once it slips through your fingers, does not simply come back around next August as a derby does.

ALSO READ: Twiga Stars’ WAFCON exit not end of the road

So here is my honest, cheerful, only slightly scolding proposal for the season ahead: Cheer loudly for the Shield on August 12, by all means.

But somewhere in that same breath, spare a thought, and perhaps even a small, quiet applause, for the ladies who nearly took this country somewhere neither Simba nor Yanga has ever managed to go.