How Kwame Despite motivated Osei Kuffour to be a rich man

Footballers amass a lot of wealth during a short span of their playing career but only a handful are able to invest their money wisely and make huge returns even after retirement.

That is however not the case of former Ghana international, Samuel Osei Kuffour who even after retirement lives a luxurious life compared to most of his colleagues who are now living off the little left from their active days.

Samuel Osei Kuffour played to the apex of his career for German club football giants, Bayern Munich for 12 years helping them to win the UEFA Champions League and six Bundesliga titles.

However, after his active days, Osei Kuffour was lucky to have fallen into a good company that advised him to invest his money wisely and reap the benefits after hanging his boots.

“You have to invest your money so that when you sit back, the money will work for you,” the former Black Stars player told JoySports.

According to him, the CEO of the Special Group, Dr Osei Kwame Despite played an instrumental role in his investment decisions.

Dr Osei Kwame Despite and Osei Kuffour crossed paths during his career and it has been reported that Despite is the one who encouraged the former AS Roma defender to join the East Legon Executive club, a popular group made of predominantly rich men of affluence.

According to the media narrative, the club is Ghana’s top-class persons who are the movers and shakers of Ghana’s economy to wit they dictate the financial structure of the state and have a number of companies across the various sectors of the economy.

To be a member of this group, one ought to have chalked a certain financial threshold.

However, it is very unusual to find footballers among such corporate executives but Samuel Osei Kuffour appears to have broken that jinx.

The former Bayern Munich defender is said to be the only ex-footballer in the famous East Legon Executive Club.

The one-time AS Roma said, he took a decision to move in the company of the elderly of such calibre because, “you can have loads of friends when you are playing but the question is, are they putting any business proposals on the table? It can be envy and jealousy.

If you want to help them do help them but they cannot give good advice on investments because they haven’t been there and haven’t done it before. For the players who use childhood friends as their advisers on business, it’s a little fishy. Some of them can give wrong advice and sometimes out of envy and this could mess up your money.”

The ex-Black Stars captain professed that when he met Dr Osei Kwame Despite, the business magnate advised him to invest most of his wealth into real estate which was by then an untapped business venture.

He expressed – with a smirk – that over the years that wise advice from his old friend has helped him to a number of properties that fetches him more income.

“He [Dr Osei Kwame Despite] would call me and say Sam I know you played this game and made some good money and let’s purchase this property. By the time I realized I had acquired quite a number of properties.”

“Dr Osei Kwame Despite, CEO of the Despite Group also checked on me and asked about how well I was saving money.”

So to borrow the biblical scripture in Proverbs 13:20, “keep company with the wise and you will become wise,” he told Joy News.

Samuel Osei Kuffour surrounded himself with a good group of experienced entrepreneurs and experts who provided him with sound advice. He followed those solid advise and is still a millionaire today.

Author: Joseph Adamafio