We may have experienced some sort of harassment in one way or another in our old ages. However, it becomes worse when committed against a young person or to a vulnerable member of the society.

Harassment occurs in different settings but this article particularly focuses on those that happen during the sporting activities. It aims at promoting a child-friendly sporting environment or rather "safeguarding” the children, particularly those pursuing football.

I got the motivation to write this from both my son and daughter who are both amateur footballers in one academy in Rwanda. Before joining this academy, they were in another that I had initially considered among the best in terms of talent identification and development. While there for some time, they kept requesting to be transferred. Like any other parent, I thought they were just having excuses, but we obliged and transferred them to the current Academy.

Meanwhile, I was compelled to dig deeper into the matter mainly to figure out what could have happened at the previous academy. I got to understand trail of concerns that needed to have been addressed for not only my kids but to ensure all of them are safeguarded.

The major issues such as silent bullying amongst them that went undetected and eventually created very hostile environment. Others included absence of child friendly reporting channels where kids develop fear for reprimand or perceived harassment for speaking out.

To grow and thrive even in football or any other sports, every child needs a solid foundation of physical safety, emotional security and mental well-being. These are global child protection standards that are required to be observed by parents and those entrusted with children at different stages of their lives. It amounts to neglect when a person with the responsibility along with the means, knowledge and access to services fails to provide these standards.

Such neglects have a long-lasting impact.

Bullying itself can be damaging and distressing to a child and the impact could be carried into adulthood. This, therefore, requires those on the fore front of these organisations such as football academies all the way to the associations to develop anti-bullying measures and policies as a matter of principle. I believe whenever some of these are highlighted, all of us as stakeholders need to come up with extra measures to mitigate them.

Parents need to have deeper engagement with their kids to understand not only their needs but also any likelihood of perceived fears that, they might be experiencing. Transferring our kids may definitely not have been the absolute solution. Had we known, we could have advocated for creation of an environment where children feel safe in all dimensions.

For instance, working together to put in place child safeguarding policies for prevention of other likely harms or any form of harassment from any person including fellow children.

We could have made a greater impact had we contemplated or communicated a possible harassment or bullying, although we never had any idea at that time of transfer. It is possible that the academy management was not aware of all these too.

This awareness creation can now serve as a foundation to recognize existence of such happenings and prevent their occurrence so as to timely protect the interest of our children as they pursue their sporting dreams.

Moreover, FIFA's safeguarding framework stipulated under Safeguarding Policy of 2026 emphasises prevention, appropriate reporting mechanisms and accountability across football. The framework recognises that everyone involved in football has a right to protection from harassment, abuse and exploitation. Things as simple as calling upon children for a trial or training and a coach repeatedly ignores or excludes some, may make a child emotionally abused.

There are several cases of unintentional harassment or abuse that could be taking place if there is absence of policy document or when the existing ones are not applied.

Therefore, child safeguarding measures at each stakeholder organisation would bridge underlying gaps. There should be a deliberate effort to put in place an action plan on how the interest of the child is protected at both organisational and activity levels.

Specifically, having policy guidelines and procedures manual along with a focal person who handles safeguarding issues at each organization would help in keeping children safe and sound as they develop their talents. Parents, coaches, and sports organizations have a duty of care to put children`s welfare before winning!

The author is a football scouting and safeguarding enthusiast