WORLD football governing body Fifa last week finally ended speculation on the legitimacy of the Philip Chiyangwa-led Zimbabwe Football Association Zifa excecutive by ordering fresh elections “as soon as possible in accordance with the Zifa statutes and regulations.
BY DANIEL NHAKANISO
“We can confirm that Fifa has sent a letter to Zifa on 24 April informing them that given that the current Zifa executive committee inherited the four-year mandate of the previous executive committee under Cuthbert Dube that began in March 2014, elections of a new Zifa executive committee should take place as soon as possible in accordance with the Zifa statutes and regulations,” a Fifa spokesman said on Tuesday.
Chiyangwa had since the start of the year insisted that his term as Zifa president would only expire in 2020, arguing that the notion that he was elected to finish off Cuthbert Dube’s term was wrong.
“There is nowhere in the Zifa constitution where a president is elected to finish the term of his predecessor. Section 38 of our football bible speaks explicitly to this,” Chiyangwa was quoted in some of sections of the local media.
“Section 38 (1) of the Zifa constitution says ‘the president shall be elected by congress for a period of four years.’”
This was a startling about-turn by Chiyangwa, who had all along admitted that he was only completing the remainder of Dube’s term and would instead seek higher office at CAF or Fifa after completing his term.
After Fifa refused to endorse his unconstitutional U-turn, Chiyangwa was last week forced to eat humble pie and accept that his term of office had indeed expired.
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As Chiyangwa prepares to seek a fresh four-year mandate from the Zifa congress, The Sports Hub looks at his just-ended tenure at the helm of Zifa, highlighting his promises before his election, successes and failures.
He promised heaven on earth for the cash-strapped organisation before his election into office in December 2015, but results on the ground show Chiyangwa delivered nothing in his just over two-year stint at the helm.
Just like when he took over from his predecessor Dube, Zifa remains saddled by a ballooning debt, which according to an audit report of the 2016 financial year had by January risen from 6 541 879 to $7 353 324.
Last month Chiyangwa said he had reduced the debt to $2 million, a claim which was disputed by several creditors owed by the football association.
In fact, Chiyangwa will leave the local football mother body even poorer after losing some of its assets while being tied to questionable long-term deals, which will sink it into further financial ruin.
Several Zifa properties and assets are now registered in the names of associates and companies linked to the Zifa president, who in 2017 alone earned $72 000 by renting out his business offices along Enterprise Road in Harare to the association.
Chiyangwa ordered the Zifa offices to be relocated from its official headquarters at 53 Livingstone Avenue in Harare, where they were paying no rentals, to his private premises, where he is set to milk a total of $420 000 in rentals from the broke association until 2021.
The financial mess Zifa finds itself in is just but a tip of the iceberg.
From countless bans meted to football administrators deemed critical to his leadership to clashes with the Premier Soccer League and complete disregard of the association’s constitution, it has been a chaotic two years in Zimbabwean football under Chiyangwa.
Zifa presidential aspirant Patrick Hokonya, who last month became the first local football administrator to publicly express interest in contesting for the Zifa presidency, was scathing in his analysis of Chiyangwa’s term at the helm of the local football mother body.
“It has been a total disaster; we had so much hope from what we had heard that he was going to use his contacts in the business community to assist local football,” Hokonya told The Sports Hub in an interview.
“When people were calling for Chiyangwa to come into football, it was not because they wanted his money. Due to his business background, they were hoping to have somebody who could bridge the gap between business and football and have people investing in the local game. Instead, he has been a total failure and Zifa has failed even to organise a cup tournament that is run by Zifa,” Hokonya said.
Chiyangwa has in the past cited his ascendancy to the Cosafa presidency and the lead role he played in finally bringing an end to Issa Hayatou’s lengthy stay as CAF boss as some of his major achievements in the last two years.
Hokonya, who is a former Central Soccer League boss, however, said Chiyangwa had expended most of his energies in boardroom battles both at home and beyond the country’s borders, which did not yield any benefits for Zimbabwean football.
“He has focused on the wrong things including meddling in battles that don’t concern us. The campaign against Hayatou did not bring any benefits to Zimbabwean football. We celebrated when he was made Cosafa president, but we have not seen anything positive come out of it.”
“He was made the vice-chairman of the CAF Afcon Games Committee, but what benefits has Zimbabwe derived from it? There are so many competitions that are hosted by CAF.
besides the Afcon, there are a lot of junior and women’s continental competitions, but Zimbabwe is not anywhere near hosting any of those tournaments.
“He has been fighting local football institutions like Highlanders and interfering in the internal politics of clubs when he is failing to run his own association and going through the whole year without having an annual general meeting [AGM].
“He’s moved the association from its traditional home to his personal offices, earning an income from the ailing association in the process, which is serious conflict of interest. I’m trying to look for even one positive thing which he has done for Zimbabwe, but I can’t,” Hokonya fumed.
