Chronicle Editor
Eddie Chikamhi, Harare Bureau
THE Zifa Normalisation Committee yesterday met a group of legends and football elders as part of the engagement efforts with domestic football stakeholders in the quest to get the game back on its feet.
The interim football leadership led by Lincoln Mutasa was set up by Fifa to bring normalcy to Zimbabwean football two months ago.
And, yesterday they heard presentations from football luminaries that included Dynamos legend Moses Chunga, former Zifa board member Benedict Moyo, former Zifa technical director Nelson Matongorere as well as celebrated former referee Wilfred Mukuna, who was among the invited delegates.
The committee has also sought input from domestic football encyclopedias and influential figures such as the veteran administrator, Lazarus Mhurushomana and Francis Zimunya who is now the chairman of the Lifelong Footballers Trust of Zimbabwe.
“We are happy with the way things are shaping up,” said Mutasa.
“We believe the football stakeholders are the ones who know the direction they want the game to take.
“So today we met some of the stakeholders and we believe everyone has different viewpoints, which we need to take into consideration. From where we are coming from, all ideas are valid to grow the game.
“At the end of this all, we will sit down, summarise and then come up with a plan of action which we believe will benefit Zimbabwean football in a big way.
“So, we will engage all the stakeholders, everyone is important. Those we haven’t met yet; their time will come. The scheduling is being worked out.
“As a committee we believe that in order to achieve our mandate, everything has to be done properly. So we will go stage by stage until we get there.”
Mutasa leads a five-member committee that also has former Mighty Warriors defender and coach Rosemary Mugadza, ex-Highlanders defender Sikhumbuzo Ndebele, legal practitioner Nyasha Tashinga Sanyamandwe and Chartered Accountant Cynthia Malaba as the vice-chairperson.
The committee is seized with restructuring the association and setting up the stage for international football to resume in the country.
The engagements with stakeholders are expected to bring the football family together and assist the committee chart the way forward in the quest to find permanent solutions to the complex nature of the challenges that had brought Zimbabwean football to its knees before the interventions by the Sports and Recreation Commission and Fifa.
Zimbabwe are coming from a 17-month Fifa suspension that was only lifted on July 10.
Mutasa said the engagements, which are expected to be conducted with the wider football community in the coming weeks, have been called by the interim football leadership to give them direction in their mandate.
Before the Fifa sanctions, Zimbabwean football had been destroyed by corruption and maladministration. Also, the football administration in the country had become so toxic. Instead of focusing on the core business of developing the game locally and leading the nation to success on the international stage, endless in-house fighting and the widespread scheming against one another had become the order of the day among football leaders.
Factions, much worse than those that could be found in politics, had emerged in domestic football leadership and these divisions only helped to tear the game apart.
The situation came to a head during the Felton Kamambo era, leading to the breakdown of relations between Zifa and the international football family.
Zimbabwean football has not progressed in the last few decades because of these administrative challenges.
From a nation that was once ranked in the top 40 of the global FIFA rankings during the 1990s, Zimbabwe has been on a free-fall, when other countries were actually making strides upwards.
Zimbabwe are now ranked a distant 125th in the rankings.
The domestic game is in Intensive Care and it needs input from all interested parties to regain its former glory. The Normalisation Committee was given until June 30, 2024, to set up new structures and organise elections for a new executive.
Online Reporter