“The crashing waves, it looks like it’s a burning furnace of boiling water.”
Prince Asante Sefa-Boakye (Uh-sahn-tee Say-fa Boo-ah-chee) sits in the shade in the Coronado Cays, his skin almost the same color as his hair – a deep black, his dark blue shirt blending in with his complexion. His shoulders are noticeably broad. When he laughs, it’s loud and he shows all of his large, white teeth.
Sefa-Boakye’s paternal grandfather was a powerful chief of the Asante people in Ghana. So technically, Sefa-Boakye is a prince. He was born and raised in Coronado but in the last few years has spent a lot of time in Ghana.
He speaks of the ocean as an environmental landmark that many people in Ghana do not dare interfere with; many of them never learn how to swim in it, or even approach it if not to fish.
But Sefa-Boakye did interfere.
In 2021, he started Ghana’s first water polo team in Accra, the capital. The players train in pools but also wherever they can find a body of water, including in lakes and the ocean.
Sefa-Boakye would often visit the country to see family. “It just made sense. I played in the U.S., now let’s just make a way to play in Ghana,” he said.
He now has a boy’s and girl’s water polo league made up of seven teams ranging from 6 to 25 years old. They’re called Black Star Polo. And he has a hefty goal: He wants his team from Ghana to make it to the 2028 Olympics, and he believes it will.
Sefa-Boakye, 33, is himself a water polo athlete, and as he competed in America and internationally he never saw many Black players.
I’m the only one. It’s, like, one (time) every 25 games I get to see another Black person playing.
Prince Asante Sefa-Boakye
“I’m the only one. It’s, like, one (time) every 25 games I get to see another Black person playing,” he said.
And it’s not just water polo, it’s swimming in general.
“In order to play water polo, you have to learn how to swim. Before you have to learn how to swim, you have to be comfortable in the water,” Sefa-Boakye says. “So now, it’s a three-step process with the third step of being a water polo player is honestly just icing on the cake.”
Swimming culture in America and Ghana
In America, there are a few reasons why many Black people never learned how to swim. According to a recent national study conducted at YMCA’s by the USA Swimming Foundation and the University of Memphis, 64% of African American children can’t swim while only 40% of caucasian children can’t swim.
An article by the National Institutes of Health showed that Black people had the highest rates of drowning and a study done by Northeastern Illinois University illustrated that a big reason that was found is the history of treatment of Black people during the Jim Crow era.
A kid might never learn how to swim because their parents don’t know how to swim. Their parents didn’t learn to swim because their parents never had the opportunity to learn.
And they didn’t have the opportunity because African Americans weren’t allowed in public pools. There were “white only” pools and the pools that were provided for Black people were smaller and shallow.
When segregation ended, white people moved away from public pools and there was less incentive for upkeep of the public pools.
However, as a Black man who grew up in Coronado, Sefa-Boakye did have the opportunity to swim and started playing water polo when he entered high school. He didn’t like swimming when he was younger, but his mother put him in lessons around seventh grade to lose weight, and then his competitive side kicked in.
“I hate losing, more than I hate swimming,” Sefa-Boakye said with a smile. “So, let’s get it together.”
And he got it together. He played water polo throughout high school and continued on to play for California Lutheran University and Whittier College, where he got his degree in psychology.
After graduating, he joined teams in Spain, Germany, France, Italy and Brazil.
In Ghana, he noticed that there are different reasons why they never learned to swim. Sefa-Boakye explained the ocean and lakes are seen as a source of water and food for fishing, and other than that, are powerful and should be respected and ultimately, feared.
“They will just go out to fish but not know how to swim … you have to walk three miles to get water,” Sefa-Boakye described. “People (look) at the water as a trade, a job, a profession … it’s not for playing.”
And because of certain areas with poor infrastructure, their villages might flood from the rain and people drown.
“Whether it’s cultural or respect, fear definitely plays a role,” Sefa-Boakye said.
One of Sefa-Boakye’s team captains in Ghana, Ishmael Agyei, said that he almost drowned in a pool when he was 10 years old. He’s 22 now.
It became a point in my mind that I had to learn how to survive in water in case I find myself in such a situation again.
Ishmael Agyei
“It became a point in my mind that I had to learn how to survive in water in case I find myself in such a situation again,” Agyei said. He called from Ghana and had just gotten off a shift of working as a lifeguard at the high school pool.
“Sometimes we have to call (our parents), try to convince them that instead of being scared of the water, you’d rather learn how to be safe in the water,” Agyei said.
Agyei explained that when the high school pool was built in 2015, water-safety awareness in the community started evolving and they offered free lessons at the pool. Since then, around 15,000-20,000 students have been taught water safety, Agyei said, and from those, around 10,000 have learned how to swim.
In 2017, Agyei began taking swim lessons. Four years later, he joined Sefa-Boakye’s team and also took on a job as a lifeguard.
Black Star Polo
“Training under Asante is never easy because he always pushes you to cross your limits,” Agyei said laughing. “He has a lot of determination.
“ … When we begun, we were very weak. Let me say, we were very weak. If he wasn’t having that level of resilience, you would have said that ‘these people can never be good.’”
But they are good, Sefa-Boakye said, comparable to other teams he’s seen around the world.
“We still get letters, ‘Hey, come to Croatia, come to Europe.’ … (We have) high level international Olympic caliber referees going to coach,” Sefa-Boakye said. “For them to be toe to toe in Africa and the champions in Ghana, is great for me as a coach.”
To finance the Ghana operations, Sefa-Boakye relies on private donors, including a GoFundMe he set up years ago when he first started that has now reached a total of $41,000. That money has gone to sending the kids to play in Brazil and South Africa and for their equipment, uniforms, tournaments and practices.
Even now, if they don’t have money to buy weighted balls to practice with, they improvise and play with coconuts.
He also pays for food for about 12 children on one of his teams. Because if they’re not eating, they can’t train well.
Sefa-Boakye has a goal to reach $50,000 in that GoFundMe. He eventually wants to build his own training pool where he can invite water polo players from other countries to play in Ghana.
On top of the pride he has for his team, he knows this sport has brought them so much more than having an important life skill.
Those kids have traveled. They scored goals. They’ve seen the world. They got to see a different part of the continent or leave Africa because they didn’t give up on their swimming lessons.
Prince Asante Sefa-Boakye
“Those kids have traveled. They scored goals. They’ve seen the world. They got to see a different part of the continent or leave Africa because they didn’t give up on their swimming lessons,” Sefa-Boakye said.
Agyei said that without water polo, the boys on the team might have spent their time involved in bad situations or doing things they shouldn’t.
“So when water polo begun, instead of indulging in bad activities, your energy is turned to the poolside,” Agyei explained.
He said Ghana’s players have improved physically as well as emotionally. They’ve acquired knowledge and been competitive.
“Everybody wants to win,” Agyei said.
In 2028, if all goes well, they may get a first chance to do so on the Olympic level.
We will surely get there one day. We will surely represent Ghana in the 2028 Olympics.
“We will surely get there one day,” Agyei added. “We will surely represent Ghana in the 2028 Olympics.”
