NEW: Big day for Zim football

Tadious Manyepo

IT’S a different day in the country’s football landscape.

The 271 days of FIFA administration are coming to an end with the ushering in of a new ZIFA board to be elected in Harare today.

It will be the first such executive since the dissolution of the Felton Kamambo-led board on November 16, 2021.

Since that day, the country has gone for 671 days without sound leadership, first on auto-pilot, then under FIFA ban and then under the wings of the ZIFA Normalisation Committee.

The latter will be dissolved just before the plebiscite upon which it will assume the role of the electoral committee to oversee the elections.

The 78 voters will choose the association president, his two deputies, one of which should be a woman, and six executive ordinary members.

Martin Kweza, Phillemon Machana, Nqobile Magwizi, Makwinji Soma-Phiri, Marshal Gore and Twine Phiri are vying for the biggest chair, while 10 candidates are eyeing the vice president’s post, with a strong field of 39 hopefuls looking to clip six of the available ordinary members slots.

The elections will be preceded by the ZIFA AGM, which is about to start at the same venue, where members of the media will not have access to.