Defending champions Rwanda Energy Group (REG) Basketball Club returns in action as national basketball league kicks off next week, January 13. But the club’s oft-criticized management also known as its glaring weakness has simply been awful to begin the campaign. Besides the national league prospects, REG BBC will also feature in the much-anticipated Basketball Africa League (BAL) tournament, slated for March 11. Both tests come at a time the team is without a head coach after seasoned tactician Henry Mwinuka stepped down from his duties, a position he has held since 2019. Mwinuka’s decision to resign, which he attributed to personal reasons, came just a few months after he signed a two-year contract with the team. There was more cause for worry at the club late last year after the team lost three key players including shooting guard Jean Jacques Wilson Nshobozwabyosenumukiza, power forward Elie Kaje, as well as star- power forward Alex Mpoyo. With a few days to go, highly placed sources familiar with the team who spoke to Weekend Sport raised concerns for the club’s performance, particularly in the upcoming season blaming the club's poor management and unfair treatment to the staff members behind some consider their future elsewhere in search for greener pastures. What looks more concerning is the spirit in the locker room, sources asserted, where players say that the team has been faulting on agreements between the management and staff. “There are a lot of loopholes really. Currently you will see that the coach has resigned, our roster has been dismantled, especially for the key players, mis-coordinated management and we are now signing new junior players concerning,” a team member said on condition of anonymity. There are also disputes in players and technical staff’s contracts where one of the sources claimed that, “when you look at our contracts, all contracts are faulted, and this is particularly concerning given that we are approaching the BAL” For some of the individuals making up the team management, the source added, BAL has been used as a scarecrow to sacrifice ourselves even under harsh conditions. “At the club, we have encountered different scenarios where contracts are faulted. You sign a contract under different conditions, only to find out later that some of the segments were changed without consent,” the source claimed. On average, a player is reportedly paid between Rwf500,000 and Rwf600,000 while a head coach could be paid roughly more than Rwf2 million. However, staff members protest harsh conditions such as blocking them from leaving the club until interested teams pay their release clauses before recruiting them yet the contract terms state the opposite in case an offer comes by. Another source accused some individuals in the club management for acting unprofessionally. For instance, he said, one Job Nyandwi has on numerous occasions been on the spot over expressing non-sportsmanship while handling team operations. “One incident happened last season where we were promised to be given a bonus, if we defended our championship, only to wait in vain. This puts management on spot and this is not the first time.” “The tricky part is that the club might not receive any players open to their offers, because of the way they are being mistreated. Case in point is that some players who are being approached to feature for the team at the upcoming BAL season, have their offers rejected,” he claimed. It is likely that assistant coach Maxime Mwiseneza will not be promoted to the head coach, putting local power-house in a rush for a better fit.
