Your Excellency,

Compliments of the brand new 2020 and I hope it brings with it the freshness of thought, vision, action and the conviction to always be guided by the Almighty and all his governance paraphernalia such as the Constitution.

My letter to you Mr President is driven by the cry to you to help football, which is a religion to millions in this country and billions to the outside world. In fact in Brazil it determines who becomes the republican President.

What has been happening in our football can not be ignored a minute longer. I know you do follow the events and that you are not enchanted by what is happening, is an open secret.

But this letter from me is specific. Zimbabwean football at the moment is tottering on the brink with corruption the basal cushion. I know how much you loathe that cancer of corruption, yet we have watched nothing has been done to Failton Kamambo and his crew at 53 Livingstone Avenue.

They have been in office since December 16, 2018 but the report card has been so dirty that they have already been hauled before a parliamentary portfolio Committee on Sport, Art and Recreation to answer to some charges.

Not much has established from that September visit because Zifa has not complied with requests from the Hon Matthias Tongofa chaired Committee. I have heard they maybe called again in the new year.

But Mr President why have there been no commitment to deal with this matter from the SRC, who have statutory authority to handle such miscreants?

You appointed a new board headed by a committed lawyer and officer of the court, Gerald Mlotshwa and the SRC Act is armed to the teeth with instruments of action especially Section 30.

Why have we not seen the use of Section 30 on Zifa and save you all this trouble? Who is being protected here Mr President and why? What hold has he on the entire establishment that they can abuse USD740 270K in obvious financial debauchery and nothing happens?

Yes, Mr President that money was from FIFA but once it gets deposited into an Ecobank account in Borrowdale it becomes our money and its transactionary activities is guided by the Banking Act, which is not a FIFA act. So, why can Phelimon Machana, the de facto Zifa president transfer that money from a Zifa account into his company account, Conduit investments ( a real conduit of pillage) without following due process?

Creditors are pilling up and they include former Warriors coaches such as Sunday Chidzambwa, Rahman Gumbo, Norman Mapeza, Madinda Ndlovu, Calisto Pasuwa but Machana instead decides to pay former CEO Jonathan Mashingaidze, whom we all know is the architect of all this football madness. Meanwhile Travel Genius was defrauded of USD56K for Cosafa women tickets by the same Zifa with Mashingaidze at the hub of the scheme.

Mr President can your honourable minister Kirsty Coventry do something to ensure SRC has dealt with Zifa. Is Zifa too special in your eyes that you can allow this nuasance daily?

Did you know Mr President that you are the only nation that has no interest in football? Football is the biggest constituents and I wonder why you’re taking no interest in this key bolt and nut of the political ecosystem. That is why you see FIFA Presidents make every effort to ingratiate themselves with sitting Presidents because the assumption is they know the full brand value of football ecosystem.

I am appealing to you to have a rethink on this. The UK government milks the occasion by knighting outstanding sportsmen from the time of Prime Minister Harold Wilson post 1966 World Cup triumph because they realise they can not ignore it. Tony Blair continued it pre France 98.

We can start with football. I know Mlotshwa at SRC is keen to act but has been discouraged by the aloofness of establishment in this genre. Surely it is never late to do the right thing.

There is no interference Mr President when you seek to sort out the mess. Zifa have to be in good standing with local laws before they can be registered with FIFA, CAF or Cosafa. This is statutory and FIFA acknowledges as much in their constitution. So why is the SRC not enforcing the rules? Are they also bribed or there is an instruction from somewhere?

Intervention is not intereference. And if any action you take Mr President results in a threat of expulsion from the exclusive FIFA club, you have everyone support to take Zimbabwe out and use the time out to sort this mess. That would be a masterstroke, a trump card of some sort.

It has happened in several countries and in most countries FIFA have responded by putting a Normalisation Committee, which is surrogate leadership were FIFA pays for running the affairs while the mess is sorted.

Zifa and Zimbabwe needs that. The Constitution is hollow. The Congress is captured. The finances are a bowl of fried fish and chips with no vinegar. FIFA money and equipment is abused. Coaches training programs are abused so much that for three years coaches who paid for courses have not been certificated and the technical director is still in the job. Worse, course instructors have not been paid in the same period.

Coaches can’t work and referees are in the same predicament. A commission of inquiry into these affairs would help Mr President…our game can’t be bewitched in broad day like this Shumba!

No one is in good standing with the association and our football is captured….so captured that the Zifa leadership can go to parliament and lie under oath and nothing happens to them.

Even PSL clubs have been reduced to useless constituents where they received a few balls and equipment from the FIFA 49 000 balls and equipment donated to all associations post the Kigali Congress two years ago. Yet, Machana misrepresented and said Zifa bought the equipment for junior development. Really? Can we still trust such a leadership?

The same Zifa is pulling out junior teams from competitions. Mr President, help us to put some oil in the tank for the resuscitation of our game. Systems must work and those that aren’t doing anything must be removed, our football is too important to die.

I hope the next 364 days will be used to help our football and if you need me, I am available Mr President. Thanking you for taking your time to listen to me. The football family is crying and don’t need your lullaby but MILK.

Yours In Football

Hope Chizuzu