B.K. Edusei’s legacy lives on

Today, July 19, 2018 marks exactly 40 years since one of Ghana’s foremost football administrators, Benjamin Kyem Edusei, passed on to eternity.

He belonged to a human species which is fast becoming extinct if that process hasn’t already taken place.

In this day and age when greed, selfishness and avarice have become the norm in Ghana football circles, a name like B.K. Edusei, or BK, as he was known in football circles, won’t be to fit in.

Edusei belonged to a select class of enterprising businessmen whose belief in what was called sacrificing part of their wealth for the good of football, a game they loved so much, was beyond measure. Indeed, it is the direct opposite of what unfortunately has become the norm in the Ghanaian game today.

That he ensured by setting the pace in the poaching of top players from other clubs.

Among the most notable were wizard dribbler Osei Kofi from arch-rivals Accra Hearts of Oak and ace goalkeeper, Robert Mensah, from Cape Coast Mysterious Dwarfs.

Not the one to do things in halfs, BK and some colleague business magnates, namely S.K. Mainoo, B.M. Kufour and E.K. Osei came together to employ two foreign coaches — first Josef Ember and later Joe Keterz.

B.K. paid two years emoluments of the two foreign coaches.

He gave two of his houses in Tesano as camping places for them each time they were in Accra.

There is no doubt that all those efforts culminated in the historic conquest of Africa by Asante Kotoko in 1971 as the Porcupine Warriors became the first Ghanaian club to win the premier continental clubs championship.

His legacy surely lives on.