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Petros Kausiyo Deputy Sports Editor
ZIFA president Cuthbert Dube has blasted his fellow board members for throwing corporate governance tenets through the window in the controversial way they handled funds generated from the Warriors’ high-profile 2017 Nations Cup showdown against Guinea at Rufaro.
Dube also sharply criticised the association’s secretariat decision to disburse revenue generated from the game without seeking board approval. The ZIFA president yesterday broke his silence and opened up on the matter in which the Zimbabwe National Soccer Supporters Association have also filed a report with the Zimbabwe Republic Police in which they are seeking to have the looters brought to book.
He said it was unfortunate that the Association’s image continues to be tainted by such conduct like the free-for-all manner in which the gate receipts from the sell-out match was handled, which bordered on looting.
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The ZIFA boss also issued a public apology to Tourism and Hospitality Minister Walter Mzembi for the embarrassment and difficulty he encountered while trying to enter Rufaro to watch the Warriors.
Mzembi was acting Sport, Arts and Culture Minister on the day in question and was the ZIFA guest of honour for the match but there was no honour in the way he was received and treated at the stadium.
“It is highly regrettable that our protocol officers bungled in the way they handled the entry of Minister Mzembi and his entourage into Rufaro for the big match. We ought to have done far much better than have the Honourable Minister wait for 45 minutes in the sun outside the stadium failing to get access,” said Dube.
“On behalf of ZIFA, the football family and my own behalf I would once again want to apologise unreservedly to Honourable Minister Mzembi for the huge inconvenience he suffered and to thank him for his patience and his decision to still proceed to watch the game.”
But it is the controversy over the revenue generated from the Warriors match, and how it was disposed, which has been a major talking point in the aftermath of the Group L qualifier.
The ZIFA’s Finance Committee reported that the match, which attracted a full-house at Rufaro, grossed $88 000.
ZIFA then indicated that despite the massive crowd at Rufaro, the game had accrued a loss of $12 000 but there are a number of glaring anomalies in the income and expenditure statement released by the Association related to that match which have raised a public outcry.
Yesterday Dube said he had summoned an emergency board meeting today to discuss the controversy surrounding the gate receipts from the Warriors/Guinea game.
The Harare business executive said he was not amused with the way the funds from the Warriors clash against Guinea were disbursed directly from the cash room just hours after the big match.
“What happened in the cash room is a very untidy way of doing business and if people get to know about it, which they now do, it means the system is open to abuse and there is no security at all,” said Dube.
“You can even be raided by armed robbers because you cannot be sitting in the cash room at Rufaro late into the night counting money and making payments of huge sums. Why not have armoured security trucks, take the money for banking and then you disburse the money to the creditors in an orderly fashion?
“We are deep in the red, we have a lot of creditors and the board should have been consulted on Monday after the match so that we chip in and give direction on how best the creditors could be handled from the net revenue that we had received.
“I have ordered that such a culture of doing things should stop forthwith. Money must be transferred through the RTGS system and no cash should be handed to individuals at the stadium.
“We have a finance department and I think if creditors are assured that they would receive their money there is no need to spend the night at Rufaro counting money and making payments.
“I heard that even the Sports Commission had sent individuals to receive cash for their six percent levy . . . no that has to stop. You cannot disburse such a huge amount from the cash room at the stadium without having your finance department issuing proper payment vouchers to creditors.
“Security measures were not up to scratch. We should have used the hired security company to transport all the revenue from the gates for overnight banking through their Cash-In-Transit facility.
“Only on the following Monday should we have then held an emergency board meeting to find the best ways of disbursing the revenue we had generated against the long list of creditors we have and possibly pay some of them in portions as a show of our commitment to extinguishing the debt.
“Now what we hear happened at Rufaro was like a free-for-all in the cash room and it is unfortunate that we now have all sorts of accusations and counter-accusations coming out after all this and this is to the detriment of ZIFA and by extension my capacity as ZIFA president and my person.
“But I am clean and I am actually not happy that we did not show the basic principles of corporate governance and this dents our image in the eyes of our valued stakeholders and those that sympathise with us and understand our precarious financial position.
“It must be remembered that as ZIFA it is not every weekend that we generate money from home games and so the little that we make after a long period should be handled with due diligence.
“If FIFA and CAF who also get a percentage levy from the national teams games can receive their money through normal bank transfer systems why can’t we do that with all our creditors and use more credible business systems?’’
The controversy over the way the funds were handled has sucked in four ZIFA board members and Dube is expected to hear from them why they demanded their outstanding allowances from the proceeds of the Warriors match.
The $4 000, divided as $2 800 in match expenses and $1 200 in travel and subsistence fees, which was deducted from the match revenue, was curiously not reflected on the income and expenditure statement for the match.
Dube revealed that he would also demand clarity on what really transpired with the $20 000 ZIFA received from Prophetic Healing Deliverance Ministries leader Walter Magaya.
“Any money coming from donors should go through the books of ZIFA so that there is a paper trail of what we received as donations and what we borrowed. I would also want to know the actual attendance figures for the match, how many $3 tickets were sold how many of the $5 and $10 tickets were sold and the number of complimentary tickets that were issued.
“I believe the board should also approve the number of complimentary tickets that are issued for each game,’’ said Dube.
Herentals College denied that they were paid the $3 000 which ZIFA claim went to the hiring of buses for use by the Warriors and Guinea while the $12 500, reflected as having been paid to cover a debt from someone who helped ZIFA secure air tickets for the players and match officials, was another dummy given that the person who bailed out the Association is yet to be paid his dues.
Online Reporter