Meet Seth Boois, the new technical director for Namibian football

THE new Namibia Football Association (NFA) Technical Director Seth Boois sees his job as that of developing technical structures and policies as well as attending to all areas of football development.

Boois, confirmed as technical director on June 30, told Nampa in an interview that an in-depth study has established that as part of improved football development and human resources management, a national strategy should be developed to consider technical aspects that would help to achieve any sort of development objectives. Boois singled out coaching programmes, youth development, co-ordinating coaching courses for coaches, referees, women’s football and all activities of the national teams as his priorities.The soft-spoken Boois was born in Otjiwarongo.He started playing football at an early age, receiving his first coaching instruction from Cornelia Amulungu, a netball player of Life Fighters at Otjiwarongo.He then moved up on the football ladder to become a top player, coach and administrator of Premier League side Black Africa.But his ascendancy to the throne of Black Africa was not before he donned the jerseys of Rocco Chiefs and Orlando Tigers, both from the central northern town of Otjiwarongo.Apart from football, Boois was also a boxer while at Augustineum Secondary School in Windhoek.”Football took over and I went to play for Ramblers in 1977 while I was still at Augustineum.But on the insistence of Rusten Mogane I joined Black Africa and together with Kandas (Bonny) Paulino, the late Moses Crooks Casper and Fighter Louis, we became the first group of young players to be introduced to the club’s development programme by Five Hochobeb, who later went on to become a football administrator at national level.”In his heydays, Boois’s passion for football took him to Arandis where he played for Chiefs and for African Warriors of Swakopmund.He returned to Windhoek and was made assistant to Mogane who was then player-coach of Black Africa.Said Boois: “I took over the hot seat at Black Africa when my mentor was appointed as national team coach.”Soon afterwards, he was one of the first Namibians to benefit from the National Soccer Technical Development Programme, initiated by the Namibia Football Association (NFA) in 1990, under Doc //Naobeb, the founding President of the Association.With assistance from Bob Kandetu, then Chairman of Black Africa and Mogane, Boois became the first Namibian football coach to receive advanced training in Brazil in 1992.He was subsequently nominated to attend a Fifa-sponsored Solidarity High Level Football Coaching Course in Swaziland.He added to his long list of coaching qualifications the A-licensc that he received after attending the Hennef Sport-Schule in Germany during 1998.Since 2002, Boois served as coach of the national under-23 team, playing 11 matches and losing only two of those to Nigeria and Zambia.Prior to that, he was appointed coach of the senior national team in 1998/99, taking the Brave Warriors through seven matches with three victories, an equal number of losses and one draw.Ironically, the drawn match against Zambia in Lusaka in 1998 is what Boois cherishes most from his stint as coach as it made him the only Namibian mentor to have held the Zambian side, alias Chipolopolo, to one-all stalemate in their own backyard.Boois also indulges in writing.He is the author of two books on the local game, one on the history of Namibian football and the other on the national team.Two fictional titles, ‘Blood Diamonds’ and ‘Taxi in Windhoek’ were also penned by the multi-talented Boois.Whether he will find time to write one more football or fiction book remains to be seen but one thing is certain – his writing skills will come in very handy when the time comes to write clear and crisp development plans and strategies to lift Namibian soccer out of the current quagmire.-NampaBoois singled out coaching programmes, youth development, co-ordinating coaching courses for coaches, referees, women’s football and all activities of the national teams as his priorities.The soft-spoken Boois was born in Otjiwarongo.He started playing football at an early age, receiving his first coaching instruction from Cornelia Amulungu, a netball player of Life Fighters at Otjiwarongo.He then moved up on the football ladder to become a top player, coach and administrator of Premier League side Black Africa.But his ascendancy to the throne of Black Africa was not before he donned the jerseys of Rocco Chiefs and Orlando Tigers, both from the central northern town of Otjiwarongo.Apart from football, Boois was also a boxer while at Augustineum Secondary School in Windhoek.”Football took over and I went to play for Ramblers in 1977 while I was still at Augustineum.But on the insistence of Rusten Mogane I joined Black Africa and together with Kandas (Bonny) Paulino, the late Moses Crooks Casper and Fighter Louis, we became the first group of young players to be introduced to the club’s development programme by Five Hochobeb, who later went on to become a football administrator at national level.”In his heydays, Boois’s passion for football took him to Arandis where he played for Chiefs and for African Warriors of Swakopmund.He returned to Windhoek and was made assistant to Mogane who was then player-coach of Black Africa.Said Boois: “I took over the hot seat at Black Africa when my mentor was appointed as national team coach.”Soon afterwards, he was one of the first Namibians to benefit from the National Soccer Technical Development Programme, initiated by the Namibia Football Association (NFA) in 1990, under Doc //Naobeb, the founding President of the Association.With assistance from Bob Kandetu, then Chairman of Black Africa and Mogane, Boois became the first Namibian football coach to receive advanced training in Brazil in 1992.He was subsequently nominated to attend a Fifa-sponsored Solidarity High Level Football Coaching Course in Swaziland.He added to his long list of coaching qualifications the A-licensc that he received after attending the Hennef Sport-Schule in Germany during 1998.Since 2002, Boois served as coach of the national under-23 team, playing 11 matches and losing only two of those to Nigeria and Zambia.Prior to that, he was appointed coach of the senior national team in 1998/99, taking the Brave Warriors through seven matches with three victories, an equal number of losses and one draw.Ironically, the drawn match against Zambia in Lusaka in 1998 is what Boois cherishes most from his stint as coach as it made him the only Namibian mentor to have held the Zambian side, alias Chipolopolo, to one-all stalemate in their own backyard.Boois also indulges in writing.He is the author of two books on the local game, one on the history of Namibian football and the other on the national team.Two fictional titles, ‘Blood Diamonds’ and ‘Taxi in Windhoek’ were also penned by the multi-talented Boois.Whether he will find time to write one more football or fiction book remains to be seen but one thing is certain – his writing skills will come in very handy when the time comes to write clear and crisp development plans and strategies to lift Namibian soccer out of the current quagmire.-Nampa