Newly rebranded Arua Hills Sports Club, formerly Doves All Stars, is ready to break out of Onduparaka FC shadow in the West Nile region.
The new management has made some overhaul changes after a recent takeover and have started a new journey very ambitious.
The club held their first press conference in Kampala where former Onduparaka officials Anthony Afeti and Vegas Otelul have been unveiled as new CEO and Public Relations Officer respectively.
“Football has rivalry, its natural,” said Joel Aita Jaffer, the new Arua Hills Sports Club chairman.
“We want to pay big respect to Onduparaka, they have done a lot in promoting west Nile football. Very few people knew west Nile until Onduparaka came on board.
“However, Arua Hill sports club has come to complement what Onduparaka has done. There is more talent in West Nile and I strongly believe that we can build a partnership and hope we can promote West Nile together.”
Playing as Dove All Stars FC last season, the club finished sixth in Elgon Group of FUFA Big League.
Complete Rebranding, New Stadium
The club has carried out complete rebranding after ownership change.
As earlier stated above, the club has changed the name form Doves All Stars to Arua Hills SC.
We have carried out complete rebranding after ownership change, started with
“We wanted to have a local identity with where the club comes from,” said Chairman Aita.
The club will be playing at Barifa until the completion of Arua Hills Sports Club, a 20,000 seater Stadium that will be completed in July next year.
The stadium is constructed by Development Infrastructure which is financing the club as well.
“We are not looking at football alone, we are looking at a number of sports activities like Tennis, Volleyball, Basketball etc,” the chairman added.
As part of the branding, the logo has been changed from a Dove to a Leopard, which is a totem in the region
The chairman has explained that “West Nile is like a leopard, very calm until you touch it.”
The moto has been changed to “Together we are Kongolo (strong).”
The Five Year Strategic Plan:
The Five year strategic plan which will guide the club on where they want to be;
First two years, the chairman says that he wants stability and set new systems in place.
Within the second year as well, the club hopes to qualify to the elite league (Uganda Premier League).
The club targets international engagements in Italy, United Kingdom, France and Israel and this will help them in exchange of personnel and learning.
The team plans to have a strong academy to house the huge talent in West Nile region talent.
A women football team is also in the pipeline.
On Sustainability, the chairman says that they want to leave some businesses of Development infrastructure to sustain the club.
They want the community to also own shares in the club.
They target to get funds from selling players abroad which they think will be made able by the partnership with the international teams.
