Whoever said do not judge a book by its cover, has probably been to the edge of town or heard of what it looks like here. Tidy and unkempt, abandoned and forsaken, almost forgotten and dejected. A sacred place left unattended. With grass overgrown and mucus infested stone, they don't tell the story of what lays beneath, nor reflect the pedigree of he that sleeps underneath. The environment surely does not befits the status of the colossus he was and still is. He was just a mechanic by trade, until the white man came and told him he could achieve more with the round leather using his legs, than he could with the spanner in his hands. He dropped his spanner and followed him, and so began his reign of terror.


I reminisce of what things once were before technology revolutionised television screens. We couldn't wait to see him in our 14 inches black and white screen doing what he always did best. Those were the green, green days of glory. I shake my head when I hear people say these current crop are the best we've ever had, simply because satellite cable shows them week in, week out on crystal clear screens earning fat wages in hard currency. It’s only those who were not born when the king's father ruled, that would say this current king is the greatest. It is really disheartening to see the extent to which things have deteriorated and how we celebrate mediocrity. Whenever he took to the field, he shone like the sun and always played with passion.

According to Edmund Burke, "People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors.” To know nothing of what happened before you took your place on earth, is to remain a child for ever and ever. Let the story be told by men who were privileged to have witnessed his reign. Let the chronicles of his exploits be opened and read for all to hear, lest we forget those days of glory. For in the not too distant past, when the skies were still blue and the grasses green, on this land we call our own, THERE WAS A STRIKER

his named" RASHIDI YEKINI"