adminSikhumbuzo Moyo Senior Sports Reporter
NEWLY elected Zifa president Phillip Chiyangwa has assured Zimbabweans that he will not fail them saying the football family had voted for him to break from the “business as usual” mentality. In his acceptance speech as the most powerful man in Zimbabwean football, the flamboyant businessman scoffed at allegations that he used his vast financial resources to buy his way into domestic football’s top post.
Chiyangwa polled 40 votes while his closest rival and former Zifa chairman Trevor Carelse-Juul got 13 votes. Former Premier Soccer League and Dynamos secretary-general Leslie Gwindi and 1984 Soccer Star of the Year James Takavada got two and one vote respectively.
“This election had more intrigue, subterfuge and drama than the normal national general elections and I won. I won conclusively and resoundingly because the football family desired a break from business as usual. I shall not betray the sacred trust that the football family has bestowed on me and will never take this mandate for granted,” said Chiyangwa, who chairs his first board meeting in Harare today.
“While it’s always the refuge of the scoundrels and uninformed among us to believe that elections are won by money, the reality is much further than this simplistic understanding of the electoral process. Good strategy does triumph over boatloads of cash any day. In the contest for the Zifa presidency, I was the rank outsider, indeed more disadvantaged like a prophet at a beerhall brawl, and still pulled it off.”
He said now that the election is over, there was a need to look ahead and rebuild, restore and reposition a powerful, dedicated football family and legacy that will endure.
“I’ve triumphed in a national election that was more vicious, gruelling, bitter, most personalised, in the shortest electioneering period and above all employing the full arsenal of traditional media and multi-media stratagems in ways that’ve never been seen before in Africa”, Chiyangwa said.
He said the desire to see accountability, transparency and normal business principles reigned over petty and contrived differences and football was the biggest winner. “The contest of ideas truly went to the wire, but I cherish the clean mandate to put into practice my well-crafted, inclusive, sustainable and well thought-out ideas on taking our football forward.
“From the pain and acrimony of disunity, we’re rededicating ourselves to the great task before us. We can’t fail, must not fail and will not fail Zimbabwe in this most sacred trust of presiding over an institution so central to the creation and maintenance of our sense of unity and pride as a nation,” Chiyangwa said.
Online Reporter