adminONCE again it’s that time of the year when Zifa elections will dominate news pages across the country.
Could it be time to revive the sport or after the elections it will emerge even worse off?Sport in general in Zimbabwe has suffered a lot because of politicking. No matter how successful one is during his term, there is no guarantee that he would be retained. Success is subjective in life and hence the need for change.
Change should not be for the sake of that an election is due. It should be a serious soul-searching exercise to benefit the sport and the nation.
Power by its nature is contagious. Once one has tasted it, quitting is hard.
I note with regret that in the past a lot of investment has been made in individuals. The sad scenario is that an election is often an open game, which can go either way especially in sporting associations with sponsorship, grants and congresses for international bodies where a khaki envelope can be found stuffed to the brim with American dollar notes under one’s pillow in between meetings.
Just last year the Premier Soccer League invested in two selected officials, Joseph Mukoki and Tawengwa Hara.
Mukoki was chairman of relegated Monomotapa. He was a very level headed man who was passionate about the game and saw beyond his crumbling project.
Hara has been Chicken Inn’s secretary-general since their arrival on the Premiership scene three years ago. He has close to 18 years Division One and Premiership experience and is an Independence Cup winner and led the secretariat of Njube Sundowns, who provided the nation with the 2009 Soccer Star of the Year Evans Chikwaikwai and Coach of the Year Philani Ncube.
The two gentlemen were sent to Kenya to learn sports management and event co-ordinating in a project in which Wits University was actively involved. The two spent much of the year away in Kenya learning with a view of putting into practice on the local game what they learnt.
As fate would have it Mukoki will be in the Northern Region this season with his Monomotapa project. The Kenyan course was not about club management but running the sport at a national scale.
If he does not contest in the Northern Region elections, he will be forgotten. All he has learnt will be for himself and not the Zimbabwean game.
Very few attach predecessor value in this country and those talkative company executives who sponsor and want to run tournaments like pet projects, will never look for him at consultancy level to equip themselves and their competition.
Those in football even a passerby who will pick up a form and pay the nomination fees to satisfy his ego by trying to gun for public office will not turn to Mukoki.
What will be left will be his certificates gathering dust at home.
It is so sad that in the PSL board of governors this year, only club chairpersons will sit. That means for Chicken Inn’s Lifa Ncube will replace Hara.
If the Bulawayo lawyer subjects himself to this horrible thing called elections and fewer people vote for him, he will stay at Chicken Inn. No one outside the club may bother to seek advice from him about his travels, experiences and what he learnt.
That would be intellectual material going down the drain without many sparing a thought.
Zimbabwe football must wake up and take stock of its human resources. These two are among many examples of talented people in a number of fields not being utilised because of the Mafikizolo syndrome.
Not many know that a certain Mathemba Sibanda of Gwanda has an FA Coaching Badge. Who knows that Thabani Mnkantjo, one of the best referees to come from Bulawayo in the last 20 years, has been to the UK after retiring to learn more about assessing and training match officials.
The Zimbabwe soccer family must find room for Hara and Mukoki to put into practice what they learnt.
Zifa could do well with either as board member competitions.
Hara with his legal background could as well be the Zifa or PSL legal advisor, who sits in all meetings as an ex-officio member.
He could advise on a number of things be it labour, contracts, sponsorship deals and actual running of competitions.
Discarding talent is what we have seen done periodically. What happened to the promising team that took part in the 2010 Youth Olympics, from the medic, coaches and players, they have become history yet those 15-year-olds should have progressed as a group into the Under-17s and Under-20s with the nation taking cognisance of natural attrition of course.
But what people seem more concerned about is getting into alliances and plunging the game into a crisis. Soccer administrators have in recent weeks been courting company and hoping to get the nod to run for office.
A good administrator does not want to contest an election but is asked to by the constituency. It is for this reason that our sport does not seem to develop because of these self-seekers with hidden agendas.
If the people were let to identify selfless individuals who wake up soccer, eat, dream, live and breathe the game it would be a pleasant sport to associate with.
Money will fly left and right in the ensuing weeks as the soul of the game is sold for a few pieces of silver.
Let the true soccer people be identified and sent to be messengers of the common men who loves the game of soccer.
To those who will win congratulations, to losers join the winners and work for a better footballing nation.
Online Reporter