Out of Slum: 7 Salama Players Qualify for Kenya National Schools
July 29th, 2023 marks a milestone for CTC’s Global Outreach Initiative, as WIM Ellen Wang brought 15 players from Salama Gachie Primary School and Gachie High School to compete at the Nairobi Schools Qualifiers—the very first tournament for the current members and the alumni of the Salama Gachie Chess Club since its establishment in 2016. Amazingly, 7 players earned their qualifications to play on August 10th at the Kenya Schools National Chess Championship by winning 2 points or higher out of 6 games.
The qualifiers are Alicia Mwihaki in the U15 Girls section, Emmanuel Lioba and Brian Chinda Ayodi in U15 Boys, Gloria Wakori, Jesca Ajiza, Lucy Nekesa and Rebecca Wanjiru in Under 17 Girls.
Huge congratulations to these qualifiers as well as to the other Salama players—all from impoverished backgrounds. They must cope with life challenges day-in and day-out to continue with their education and chess study, and to be able to play and win the national qualifications is by no means a small feat! In fact, these players had to cook and pack their own lunch and travel by public bus for one hour and a half to make it to the tournament venue!
There are many people CTC wants to say thank you to for helping make this happen. Big thank you to Mercy Kamoni, who helped register the Salama players and layout all the logistics; thank you to Catherine Biketi, Salama’s resident teacher who quickly rallied the chess club members and the alumni in Gachie High School; thank you to the two Salama faculty members who chaperoned the players to and from the venue; thank you to Chess Kenya for waiving half of the registration fees and many other chess families and coaches who extended their helping hands on site; and lastly, thank you to all CTC donors—without their generosity, CTC’s Global Outreach leaders would not have been able to visit Nairobi in March to build strong coalitions with the Salama players and Kenyan chess families, and to cover all the expenses to send these players to the qualifiers and to the national.
For the full album of this big day, please visit here. Please join us to wish all qualifiers the best for their debut at the national!
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