Chronicle Editor
Lovemore Dube
FORMER Zifa president Vincent Pamire has said the launch of the Council of Southern Africa Football Associations (Cosafa) was a positive development for football in the Sadc region.
Zimbabwe will host to the 44th Sadc Summit in August in Mount Hampden outside the capital Harare. The region which was previously Sadcc became Sadc on 17 August 1992 after the signing of the Sadc Declaration and Treaty. Pamire said the formation of the regional football bloc had come in handy to bring the people of the member States together as they shared a lot of common things.
“Football is a big constituency and brings people together without any boundaries. With the leaders of the member countries having been brought together during their struggles for Independence mainly as Frontline States, there needed to be close political, economic and cultural ties. There is so much in common as the countries were divided by borders during the colonial era yet they shared language and culture.
“The formation of a regional football body even unified people more. Football is the world and the region’s number one sporting discipline which does not discriminate,” said Pamire. He said the launch of the regional body had ended years of international football drought for national teams. The countries compete against each other at regional level which allowed neighbouring States to evaluate how good they were before seeking to conquer Africa.
“Before you can want to conquer Africa, you have to deal with the region first, continent then the world. It is cheaper to compete in the region and evaluate your strength and we get to develop as a region with deliberate programmes that benefit all 16-member countries,” said Pamire.
He said while Zimbabwe, Malawi and Zambia used to compete in the East and Central Africa (Cecafa) tournament, other countries in the region were inactive. Pamire said Fifa then recognised the region and started designing development programmes for the Sadc countries which constituted Cosafa.
Fifa went as far as ensuring that Botswana who coincidentally house Sadc and the Africa Union Sports Council (AUSC Region Five) headquarters, also set base there. AUSC (Region Five) is an arm of African Unity (AU) which runs sport in the region. “Having Cosafa, it meant we had specific programmes for our region for coaches, administrators and referees. It created a platform where we sought help as a bloc, we spoke as one voice to Fifa and it became easier for us to be heard when we sneezed,” said Pamire.
The Council of Southern Africa Football Associations (Cosafa) was established by the Supreme Council of Sports in Africa now AUSC. According to the Cosafa website, the region brings together 14 nations of Southern Africa under a single umbrella, with the goal of developing the game in the region. “This is not just from a playing point of view, but also with respect to referees and the administration of the game. Cosafa was formed in 1983 in Malawi.
“The 14-member countries of Cosafa are Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Associate Member Reunion,” reads an extract of the write up on the region’s founding.
Botswana’s Ismail Bhamjee and Ashford Mamelodi became the organisation’s president and secretary-general respectively in 1992. Cosafa opened an office in Johannesburg which is considered the hub of the region. Sue Destombes is the executive director of Cosafa with Angolan Artur de Almeida e Silva since 2022.
Cosafa has a number of competitions in the senior, Under-20 and Under-17 age-group, as well as a beach soccer tournament and Women’s Champions League. When the Cosafa Cup for seniors was introduced in 1997 sponsored by Castle, it was described by Fifa as the best regional competition in the world.
Sadc is a Regional Economic Community comprising 16 member States; Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo, Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Online Reporter