Coach Afranie poses with officials of Dan deVan in one of his visits to the Dan deVan recently
Seasoned Ghanaian football tactician Emmanuel Kwasi (EK) Afranie is set to be immortalized in the coming days with the unveiling of a sculpture as well as the naming of a street in his honour.
The initiative, birthed by Daniel Mensah, chairman of the Dan-de Van Group of Companies, a Freight Forwarding firm is to celebrate the legendary coach for his impeccable coaching credentials and performance in and beyond the shores of Ghana.
To the Dan-de Van boss, the decision for the initiative was to create a platform to honour and recognize national sporting heroes beginning with the 1991 U-17 deputy World Cup winning coach, popularly referred to as coach Hene.
Recounting with sadness how the exploits of seasoned coaches like CK GYamfi, Jones Attuquayefio and Fred Osam Duodu were not accorded the deserved recognition till they passed on, he mentioned that the initiative will ensure that sporting heroes are given their due recognition.
He said in an interview that “What we are going to do this Friday is to launch EK Afranie Award, basically we want to reward Afranie for his merritorious service to the nation.”
“As a coach, we believe he has done it all, qualifying four different teams to the World Cup, talking about the Starlets in 1991, 1997 and in 1999 when he led the women’s national team, the Black Queens to the World Cup and in 2001 when he took Ghana’s U-20 team to the finals in Argentina. The core of that team formed the Black Stars side that qualified for the first FIFA World Cup in 2006.
“Ben Koufie is gone, we should have rewarded him, but Ghana failed to do so. CK Gyamfi, we talk a lot about Ghana being four-times African Champions – three of those cups were won by CK, again Ghana did not reward him for those successes, now he is dead and gone.”
He added that “And the list is endless and cuts across other sporting disciplines, you can talk about Jones Attuquayefio and then recently Fred Osam Duodo, so Dan-deVan has decided that we are not going to sit down anymore for us to lose our heroes but honour them while they are still alive.”
“It’s not only EK Afranie that we are going to celebrate, it is just the beginning, we have DK Poison who Ghana owes after he lent the nation money after winning a World title and still has not been paid.”
He mentioned that his Coach Hene title would officially be conferred on him by a traditional ruler in the Ashanti Region saying, “We don’t want to get involved in the politics of the situation, we just think it is time to start honouring our heroes starting with EK Afranie.”
“We have got a lot of things lined-up for him, this Friday we will present him with a dummy cheque and in the coming weeks there will also be a street naming ceremony for him, his sculpture will be erected in Kumasi then we will make his Coach Hene title official.”
Meanwhile, it has emerged that the celebrated coach has suffered shipwreck(seriously ill) and on admission at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital.
Consequently, a high powered delegation from Dan deVan Group of Companies- Dennis Moore, Stephan Lecosson- vice president and former Ghanaian international Ali Jahraa and Daniel Nii Mensah had visited the coach at the Korle-Bu Hospital.
By Kofi Owusu Aduonum