The Federation of Uganda Basketball Association (FUBA) is all systems go ahead of hosting the FIBA Zone V Afro-basket Qualifiers (Women).
The event due February 14-19 2023, will be held at the Indoor Arena in Lugogo.
These are the qualifiers for the FIBA Women’s Afrobasket in 2023 (an equivalent of the Women Africa Cup of Nations for Football) that will be played in Rwanda next year.
And Uganda will be represented by the Senior Women National Basketball team, the Gazelles.
Other Zone V countries like Egypt, Kenya, Rwanda, South Sudan, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Somalia etc are expected to come to Kampala.
“As FUBA and country we are ready because we bid to host this event in Kampala,” FUBA President Nasser Sserunjogi told The-SportsNation in an exclusive interview.
However, the Federation is still waiting for Government assurance mainly in terms of financial support.
“At the moment we haven’t received any assurances from the Government or NCS about the financial support.
“However we plan to engage them next week, though they already have our activity plan and budgets. We shall also engage other stakeholders for support.”
Uganda has competed at the Women’s Afrobasket just twice – in 1997 (Kenya) and 2015 (Cameroon).
And hosting the qualifiers provides the country a chance to qualify for the Continental event for a third time, especially since the Women’s team (Gazelles) missed out on the previous qualifiers in 2021 in Kigali due to Financial constraints.
“The event is big for us as a country given the fact we didn’t participate in the last qualifiers due to lack of funds,” Sserunjogi reaffirmed.
“It will be a disaster on our part if we fail to compete or even qualify this time. Our girls have been out of action for a very long time.”
But to achieve the qualification, it will call for support that can enable early preparations of the team.
Sserunjogi said that they plan to summon 25 players who will start non-residential training from January 14 before the team is trimmed to the 12 who will enter residential.
It’s strong to note that Uganda hosted the U18 Zone qualifiers for Boys and Girls last year, with the Junior Gazelles winning the tournament and qualifying for the final tournament in Madagascar where they finished fifth.
It promises to be a tricky February for FUBA with the Men’s side – The Silverbacks – set to compete for the FIBA World Cup Qualifiers due 20-28 In Luanda, Angola.
