‘Ghost’ Mulee has finally won me over, off the pitch

I know very few people who can laugh as hard, long and infectiously as Jacob “Ghost” Mulee. Apparently, other than his impressive coaching résumé Mulee has the rare gift of a spontaneous, unstrained and carefree cackle which he often unleashes in heavy doses in his other job as a radio presenter.

Which is all fair. The radio show perhaps gives Mulee the much-needed chance to let off steam from the stress and strains of coaching the national team.

That’s without mentioning that the radio show, which Mulee co-hosts with one Gidi, is practically an unscripted continuous episode of raw humour disguised as a call in session to reconcile squabbling couples.

I’m not a keen listener of Mulee’s Patanisho show on Radio Jambo, but the marital problems that some of the listeners call in with are often comical, if not utterly ridiculous, going by the snippets of the show that I’ve watched on YouTube.

The hosts of the show are meant to studiously mediate these comical marital disputes, but Mulee will often burst into uncontrollable fits of laughter as the bickering couple air their dirty linen in public.

They say laughter is the best medicine. Which is perhaps why Mulee never stops laughing on air!

Equally fascinating

But aside from the joyful radio presenter whose familiar laughter Patanisho fans cannot have enough of, there is another equally fascinating side of Mulee, maybe many other sides.

The most obvious one is that you are highly unlikely to hear that kind of laughter in a Harambee Stars pre-match or post-match press briefing because, well, managing a team that perennially falls short of expectation is not a laughing matter.

Since Mulee’s reappointment as national team head coach, sometime late last year, Harambee Stars’ performance has been dismal, to say the very least.

To be fair to the man, though, Mulee is one of the most technically shrewd coaches you’ll find on these shores. He is a serial winner, both at club and national team level. The Cecafa Club Championships and Senior Challenge Cup among the big trophies that he won in his illustrious coaching career.

And back in 2004, when Harambee Stars desperately needed to return to the Africa Cup of Nations, after a decade in the wilderness, it was Mulee who pulled the rabbit out of the hat, of course with a great deal of help from a then baby-faced Dennis Oliech.

First ever win

Lest we forget, it was Mulee who pulled off another first for Kenya at the Afcon with a first ever win for Harambee Stars at the tournament with a 3-0 thrashing of Burkina Faso for a third place finish in a tough group that included West African bigwigs Mali and Senegal.

It would take another 15 years for Harambee Stars to grace the biennial continental showpiece, this time under Frenchman Sébastien Migné.

But what has struck the public are the recent media reports that last month Mulee travelled to India in the midst of a global pandemic for a minor surgery. 

Although Mulee has remained tight-lipped on the finer details of his trip, word has it that his mission was to donate a kidney for his brother. 

A truly selfless act, if indeed that is the case. Then on Thursday it emerged that a recuperating Mulee is now stranded in India following the government’s suspension of flights from India for 14 days following a surge of Covid-19 cases in the country.  

We can only wish Mulee a speedy recovery and a safe return home, where, I believe, his trademark guffaw has been sorely missed by his “Patanisho” fans.

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