adminexpected to finally announce their position on the Asiagate report.
The Zifa board had originally been pencilled in to meet at the end of June but the indaba was postponed after the associationwere installed as the Cosafa Women’s Championships replacement hosts at the 11th hour following the withdrawal of Reunion.
Another indaba pencilled in for last week was postponed following a request by a high-level Fifa delegation, visiting the country that they also wanted to meet the entire board this week. Fifa management consultant Brendan Menton and the world soccer governing body’s development officer for Southern Africa Ashford Mamelodi are in the country for an organisational review exercise that is expected to professionalise Zifa’s operations.
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However, Zifa vice-president Ndumiso Gumede said the board would now meet on Friday which will be the first time that the game’s leadership will discuss the Asiagate report since the document detailing allegations of match-fixing on the Warriors’ trips to Asia spilled into the public domain.
Gumede, who was also the acting Zifa president in the absence of Cuthbert Dube, out of the country, headed the probe team that was tasked with investigating the controversial trips to such countries like Thailand, Yemen, Malaysia, Singapore, Oman, Vietnam and Jordan. The other members of the probe team were Eastern Region chairman Fungai Chihuri, board member competitions
Benedict Moyo and the board member finance Elliot Kasu.
Gumede said they had noted that “conspiracy theories and speculation” had followed the publication of the report by the media but insisted that the Zifa board’s official position on the report would only be known after Friday’s meeting.
The veteran administrator also maintained that there were no divisions in the board over the Asiagate scam as the game’s executive had not discussed the report since his committee handed their document to Zifa president Cuthbert Dube.
“I was the acting president because my boss (Dube) was out of the country when we were advised that the Fifa delegation which would here as a follow up to the Kariba retreat wanted to met with entire Zifa board.
“We found prudent to reschedule our board meeting from Friday last week to the 19th of August so that can also meet with the Fifa delegates around the same time. Mamelodi and Menton are in town and another technical expert is coming in on Thursday,” Gumede said.
Gumede said although the probe team’s secretary Moyo had handed over the report to Dube, his committee would on Friday formally resent their findings to the 13-member board after which the Zifa executives would decide on the way forward.
“My committee will formally deliver to the entire board our report and the document that has been circulating within the fourth estate (the media) and only after that meeting shall be we know how the entire Zifa board wishes to handle the matter.
“So the board cannot be said to be divided over the report when it has never been formally discussed. It was unfortunate that we had to twice postpone our meetings because of different reasons such as hosting the Cosafa Women’s Championships at the last minute.
“Then last week we had to reschedule it because of the Fifa delegation’s visit”.
Gumede reiterated that his committee, whose report has also been criticised for lacking sworn affidavits in the testimonies, only carried findings and recommendations but had not imposed any sanctions on any of the players, coaches or administrators who were implicated.
“It must be remembered that our brief was to investigate and not to apportion blame. The gist of the matter is based on a few fundamental questions such as;
- Did the unsanctioned trips take place
- Were unusually high fees paid out after those games
- Did the association benefit
“With no paper trail at the Zifa offices there was nothing to show whether the matches were by invitation from fellow associations or whether they were organised by agents.
“It’s the view of the committee that they did their investigations as best as they could so the onus is now on the board to make a decision on how to proceed on the matter.
“Blatter (Fifa president) on his visit here said whatever decision Zifa takes, Fifa will endorse but it must be made clear that recommendations are just recommendations . . . they can be adopted or rejected,” Gumede said.
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