By S. Siapha Mulbah
As the world sets a scope on March 8 every year to celebrate International Women’s Day, it is prudent to have women in sports apart of special recognition for their respective roles played in the development of sports across Liberia. Women , too contribute immensely to the live changing activities many young Liberians are also involved .
Though their numbers in sports administration on the national scale remains challenging, the few that are around the different sporting disciplines continue to hold next to their heart a well-structured vision targeted at building a community of total inclusivity in sports.
Their workings over the years in a male dominant sector is an inspiration to hundreds of young people and has changed the perception carried by many Liberians that those that should be in charge of sports as athletes, technicians and administrators are men and men only.
From chess boards, to basketball courts and football fields among others places that day-to-day sporting activities are carried on, statistics have proven that the number of women in sports is continuously growing worldwide and with the active involvement of few Liberian women in different sporting disciplines, other women and girls continue to develop interest in joining the sporting arena in different capacities whether as athletes, coaches or administrator.
Moreover, while the competition in sports continues to gain ground, the competition now among women in improving sports with more girl’s recruitment is one worth celebrating the heroes of women sports in Liberia.
With the thousand of women and girls playing different sports, kickball is the most common women sport in Liberia. The display of kickball many years ago started with the recruitment on women’s attention to sport with the framework of the sporting discipline directed to 100% women playing right.
Today, throughout the country, kickball is played from high school to community and national levels. More to that, Kickball is now the only protected sport for women participation in the country’s biggest sporting festival which is the national county sports meet.
In Chess, Liberia as a country is on thriving line to exposing women and girls to the mind game and pushing them to the rest of the world. Today, the chess boards in Liberia with conversations of women participation will reference Abegail Karyah, Georgina Sackie, Weedor Tarplah and few others for different outstanding contributions as players and administrators.
Abegail Karyah and Georgina Sackie are both female chess players that have introduced a very strong competition among different genders and women interest in the board game. Miss Karyah is a former national women chess champion of Liberia. She dominated the women arena after taking the championship from Weedor Tarplah and became the hottest lady in Liberia chess world.
Later, Georgina Sackie another outstanding female enter the chess community to increase the battle among the few females that had suffered Abegail’s dominance. After losing different competitions and the same championships to Abegail, Geogina did not still loss focus for she believed that he could conquer one day.
In 2023, Sackie won the national chess championship women title from the hands of her major rival and captained Liberia women team to the world chess Olympiad last year in Budapest. While on the international stage, these youngsters pushed their game to the world and made marks that give them international recognition.
Weedor Tarplah is also a female chess player who played the game to the national level. She roused to serving as the country’s first female champion. After her active participation in chess competitions, she has transitioned to now a legal practitioner. Tarplah is one of the few females that the country’s chess governing body relies on for legal consultation because she once headed the federation constitution committee.
In Basketball, Walley T. Baar popularly known as Well Drogba is a household name for Liberia among women involved in the sports. Wellay, a master degree holder in human resource administration from the Cuttington University is a player of the Commissioner Female Basketball Club in the women’s division.
She also serves as Coach for Spatacus Basketball team in the Liberia Basketball Association third division league contributing to the capacity of both male and female athletes that desire to play basketball to more professional level.
Walley’s consistency has given her prominence in the sporting arena of Liberia as many young people look up to her for guidance on the fact that she continues to push her self-development by schooling and playing active basketball.
Women in football nowadays in Liberia are more like the touch bearers for women in sports. They are the face of the day-to-day women participation in sports because of the popularity of football across the world.
At the level of football governance in Liberia, Madam Jodie Seeton as the third vice president of Liberia football Association is the only female at the executive level of the FA. As a stakeholder, he is the voice of women in the decision-making process of football administration. She is the vice president for women football who continuously challenge women to take more stronger actions to increase women participation in sport.
At the level of club football Grace Weah and Benita Urey are the cause for the increasing competition in women football today because of their contributions and active involvement day and night as heads of the two leading women clubs in the country.
Grace Weah alias Master Queen is the president of Liberia Upper Women League Champion outfit Determine Girls Football Club. As the president of this club, the female influencer has motivated many Liberian girls to give fulltime to football and attracted many foreign female players to the Liberian league.
Determine is a top women football team now in Liberia with the intervention of a strong women pushing to game among young people in different ways, with her financial support, advocacy and influential interventions, the girls have made history and continue to break barriers.
On the other hand, Benita Urey as president of Shaita Angels is another women football club administrator that is leaving an indelible mark on women and girls most particularly promoting the small city of Careysburg to the world.
After playing football in the United States of America, the daughter of famous businessman Benoni Urey return to her homeland and decided to join the efforts of a challenging women football sector by supporting and joining the leadership of Shaita Angels.
Since then, the club has fast grown to become a major competitor to Determine Girls in the national league in different ways to include the featuring of foreign players, participation in international competition and fanbase among many others.
Serving top leadership at the club from President to Chief Executive Officer Miss Urey has inspired her Angels to win recover from relegation and gain promotion back to the upper women’s league, winning the Women FA Cup, the Careysburg International Off-Season tournament, LFA Supper Cup other achievements.
As technicians of football in Liberia, it is always inspiring to witness referees like Sylvina Garnett, Hannah Moses, Love Wheyee and many other females officiating games. To some extent Liberian women have move to international match officiating and evidence by several invitations to Hannah Moses who is currently in Togo alongside Sylvina Garnett for CAF duties.
As a way to celebrate International Women’s Day, let these and many other women directly and indirectly connected to sports development efforts be appreciated to inspire them to do more. Their efforts today on Liberian soil require commitment to those that are impacted. May this recognition wake and challenge them to do more…
Happy International Women’s Day to our women in sports.
