21 Oct 2015

The Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture has approved the Botswana Athletics Association’s (BAA) new structure. BAA secretary general, Legojane Kebaitse, said in an interview that they were restructuring the association. 

He said they were in the process of establishing an independent secretariat that would run affairs of the association on a full time basis.

Kebaitse said the structure would encompass, among others, a chief executive officer, a sport administrator and a high performance and sports science office that will be responsible for athletes’ medical and physiological aspects. 

He said the new structure would also comprise a public relations and marketing arm, which will be responsible for communications, events, partnerships and sponsorships. 

Furthermore, Kebaitse said BNSC would help them with an acting CEO until the association has an independent budget to run its day to day activities.

 “BAA has been successful in bringing results despite not having a full time secretariat. Now with this structure, I am confident that we will do even better,” he said.

The secretary general further said they had clinched a five-year deal with Nike to dress the national team. According to details of the deal, Nike will pay 25 per cent to BAA for each medal won on the international stage. 

He said Nike would also provide kit, spikes, tracksuits, bags and pay for athletes training camps, including flights and doctors.

Addressing the association’s ordinary general assembly recently, BAA president Moses Bantsi asked clubs to start putting their house in order to comply with the new structure. He further urged them to jealously guard the Nike sponsorship as it could be renewed with lots of benefits depending on the performance of the code.  Ends