adminFrom Lovemore Dube in Victoria Falls
THE facilitators of the Cosafa/Interpol “Train the Trainers” Integrity in Soccer Workshop here have led by example after refusing an offer to go for a free ride from one of the resort town’s major tour operators.A Victoria Falls company on Friday offered the trio of Julie Norris, Dinis Adriao and Innika La Fontaine of Interpol a flight over the falls and the game park. The company which has no direct link to football or the national soccer association had made the offer as part of its marketing and public relations.
Norris, spokesperson for the trio, said refusing the offer should not be misconstrued as lack of courtesy but should be the stance all in football should take to protect its integrity. She said match-fixing, which she is on a crusade to eliminate in the world by training trainers who would later go on to teach players and referees in their respective countries in Southern Africa, started with small gifts and favours.
These, she said, often led to others until there was a need for the favours to be returned. She said this could be in the form of a favour to manipulate a match result for sporting reason or for financial gain.
“We are not being discourteous; we are travelling all over the world preaching integrity and how match-fixing starts. We should be the ones leading by example and we want to be role models to national associations and everyone else.
“Indeed we appreciate the hospitality extended to us by Zifa and Victoria Falls but our organisation’s ethics do not allow us to take gifts of any sort. That way we believe our integrity and that of the sport is protected. We all have an obligation to keep the game clean,” said Norris.
She was one of the facilitators at the three-day workshop which ended yesterday afternoon with participants now expected to go to their countries and spread the word against match-fixing.
Norris said illegal betting and match-fixing had no room in the multi-billion dollar industry which is football. Representatives of Angola, Mozambique, Lesotho and Zimbabwe took part in the workshop which is a follow up to one held in South Africa last year.
The Southern African region has in the past decade had a problem with betting and match-fixing syndicates from Asia. It has been found that the most vulnerable soccer people are players and referees.
Young and very gullible players and those approaching retirement without making the best of their earlier career opportunities are prone to playing into the hands of betting syndicates.
Online Reporter