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Ray Bande
Senior Reporter
MUTARE City Council will gobble nearly US$200 000 for the much awaited turf and drainage renovations to Manicaland’s ceremonial home of football — Sakubva Stadium — which begun in earnest on Saturday.
Removal of the old turf at Sakubva Stadium is now complete and the facility will soon be undergoing excavation works, removal of soil, engineering works of laying down of new drainage system, back filling, compacting, laying down of new turf as well as maintenance of new turf until it reaches suitability.
Irked by continuous Zifa stadium periodic grounds assessments that would usually result in the facility intermittently being suspended from hosting top flight football, the eastern border city local authority finally chose to do a once off job that will last almost seven months to finality.
Technically, this means Sakubva Stadium will not be open for any kind of use to any organisation until the completion of the renovations to its drainage and turf.
Such is the commitment from the local authority to this project that the US$200 000 IS being channelled towards sprucing the facility while an average of US$10 000, at the official bank rate, is all that Mutare City Council got in revenue from Sakubva Stadium the whole of last year.
Mutare City Council Acting Town Clerk Blessing Chafesuka told Post Sport that the local authority had to head hunt the contractor to do the job after failure to get desired results from tender procedures executed on three occasions.
To avoid falling prey to some tenderprenuers, a term given to corrupt fly-by-night service providers that are very good at paper presentation and yet have no capacity to execute given tasks, Chafesuka said they looked at the track record of the contractor, who is the brains behind the renovations of Ngezi Platinum’s Baobab Stadium and FC Platinum’s Mandava Stadium, before taking the decision to award them the contract.
He said the payment, which was negotiated from around US$300 000, will be done in hard currency.
“It took very long and a lot of effort was invested to get to this point. It also demands a lot of resources and commitment to get this done. We can ask ourselves when was this kind of project last done by the council? That only should help everyone appreciate our commitment to this project.
“We went to tender on about three occasions and that did not yield in the desired results. That is when we had to head hunt for the contractor after considering some of the works they did in the past. We were satisfied and gave them the contract after visiting the Ngezi Platinum FC and FC Platinum home grounds, which were done by the same contractor.
“We negotiated the amount from around US$300 000 to the agreed figure which is almost US$200 000. Our month by month collections from Sakubva Stadium amounted to about US$10 000, at the official exchange rate but here we are pouring US$200 000 that was sourced elsewhere from the City Council coffers and this is all because we understand the importance of this facility to the community.
“We request every stakeholder’s support financially and morally to get thru. As Acting Town Clerk, I believe, and so should all well-wishing residents, that this is our progress to celebrate, so let’s get it down. Everyone’s motivation to the staff on ground is moral support that we want. Let’s be positive, negativity will weaken effort,” said the acting City of Mutare town clerk.
There is some spill over benefits to the ongoing Sakubva Stadium renovations, part of which will see Chisamba Ground in Sakubva high density suburb, benefiting from the not-so-bad turf that is being removed from Sakubva Stadium.
Even though most sporting enthusiasts in Mutare would have preferred the lawn being removed from Sakubva Stadium to be used at Spots Oval Ground for numerous security, durability and location of the ground, among other sports related reasons, Chafesuka said: “We have also identified Chisamba Ground as the place where we are going to have the turf being removed from Sakubva Stadium. This means the renovations of sports facilities owned by City of Mutare are now being spruced up, not just Sakubva Stadium.”
The only Castle Lager Premiership team resident in MutareManica Diamonds supporters’ chairman Brian Chibwana, said: “I am happy that work has commenced at Sakubva Stadium as per promise. I applaud that and am fully supportive of the move.
“It is good that they are walking the talk. I am praying that it’s completed in time and soccer is brought back to our doorsteps. Well done City Council. Guess weekly updates would keep everyone in the loop as not everyone will be able to visit the facility. Once again I salute you for your commitment to this initiative.”
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