A Nation At A Loss: There’s More To Life Than Playing Football For Mwepu
In the wake of a medical diagnosis that has virtually ended the playing career of one of Zambia’s most exciting and hugely talented midfielders to have graced the game the last 10 years, the nation and global football community is drenched in sorrow and anguish.
Medical experts in England have ascertained that Chipolopolo skipper Enock Mwepu’s career effectively ends immediately following the diagnosis of what they describe is a hereditary heart condition.
It’s a blow! One hell of news he least expected, much less his family, club and country mates.
Vice-President Madam WK Mutale Nalumango is even flirting with the idea of a team of medical experts being assigned to Mwepu’s case so the country can have its own medical findings.
It’s been very difficult to stomach the thought that a scintillating player who roams the middle of the pack with ease and class will no longer don Chipolopolo colors.
Two types of feelings are evoked – the selfishness in humans to still want the brilliant talent to grace our national colors and the ubuntu in many that empathizes with a promising career cut short before realizing its full potential.
These feelings are undeniably justified.
It truly hurts to see, know, and accept that Mwepu is leaving the stage barely a season after showcasing his talent on the biggest football stage – the EPL.
The thought of how the news was broken to him and his resulting reaction is even worse for a lad who has kept dreaming big from his days as a youngster in Chambishi.
Nonetheless, there is a bright side to this unfortunate development.
At 24, Mwepu is still with us and willing to play “some role in football”.
Yes, in his ‘Father’s’ game there are many roles to satisfy his passion’.
It could have been worse, but thankfully, the situation was detected at the time Mwepu’s life was preserved.
The chilling details of his transit from Mali to England, as private as they must be kept, are gut wrenching.
In the last week or so since the time the news of this situation broke, I have read a plethora of opinions on Mwepu’s circumstances.
Many are understandably hurting for him.
Some are giving Mwepu hope just like he himself who is the most affected of all of us has emerged with an ounce of bravery to reassure that “not all was lost”.
His colleagues have shared their thoughts, soccer fans are also doing the same just like politicians have equally jumped on the wagon.
The images of Emmanuel Banda, Klings Kangwa, Brighton, and Nkwazi among other players donning apparel in honour of Mwepu is a stark reminder of the reality we are enduring.
Even in the absence of a full medical diagnosis being made public, a few Zambian medical doctors have also given their expert view arising from the available information.
Among those pouring out are a section of soccer fans believing there’s still hope Mwepu can play going by some previous cases prominent among them former Nigerian star Nwankwo Kanu, Danish star Christien Eriksen and Argentina’s Sergio Aguero.
According to available records, Kanu was born with a congenital heart defect discovered in 1996 after the Olympics. It was feared he would never play but the situation that affected his aortic valve was corrected through surgery allowing him to continue his career. Eriksen collapsed during a Euro 2020 match and it was feared he would never play again, but with the help of an implanted device known as an ICD; he is actively playing for Manchester United.
Aguero was diagnosed with a cardiac arrhythmia before being prematurely forced out.
One player not mentioned prominently in this discourse is former Bolton Wanderers and Congolese native Fabrice Muamba who collapsed during a match against Tottenham Hotspurs in 2012. He was diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) which medical experts say is a hereditary heart condition in which part of the heart muscle becomes much thicker.
The most basic or layman explanation a medical doctor gives about a person diagnosed with HCM is that which determines the heart functioning at the rate of an 80 year-old individual when in reality that individual is 25 or 28 years.
Heavy physical activity, medical experts have ascertained, is among the highest risk factors for a person with HCM.
That explanation makes sense; imagine subjecting an 80 year-old person to the rigorous duties of a professional footballer?
The good news; however, is that persons with such a condition can still live a full life expectancy especially with good medical intervention.
This scenario may not relate to Mwepu, but remains common among sportsmen and women.
We would all love to see Mwepu back on the pitch.
But having an idea of the levels of medical attention the western world gives to human life, it will be surprising that personnel in England arrived at their conclusion without an exhaustive process.
In fact doing so has potential for serious legal ramifications.
Having accessed medical facilities both in Zambia and elsewhere, I have no doubt the levels of attention Mwepu was given and is still receiving is intense and thorough.
As a devout Christian, one who is cognizant of the fact that evolution, medical science & religious theories can sometimes be poles apart, I realistically still believe in miracles.
What has been surprising, if not disappointing, is a clear lack of institutional memory in my country.
Mwepu’s case is not the first, and potentially not the last. But our sports medical archives seem to be at a loss.
On August 29, 2007, Zambia was in mourning. We lost one of the most hard-working footballers in striker Chaswe Nsofwa after he collapsed on the pitch while playing for Hapoel Be’er Sheva in Israel.
His cause of death was ruled as cardiac arrest. To this day, Zambians don’t know the type of cardiac arrest that was.
Yet, it would have been the basis for us, as a country, to learn and research widely about a condition that is apparently rife in sport.
The incident with Muamba, who had to cut his career short, can be credited to the medical inventions that has helped the likes of Eriksen to stay on the pitch. Our colleagues in England did not know what hit them and delved into research.
Rather than demand a comprehensive post mortem in Chaswe’s case so we could learn from the situation, we rolled the red carpet for the Israeli player agent and to this day allowed him market players without recourse.
Anyway, whatever we do, we must accept that there is more to life for Mwepu than playing football.
He remains a treasured asset with great potential to inspire many in the sport.
I send my prayers and thoughts to Comps Mayaya.
Shalom.
By Augustine Mukoka
Kalemba