THE newly elected Zimbabwe Football Association (ZIFA) board led by Felton Kamambo is set to move the association offices from controversial predecessor Philip Chiyangwa’s $10,000 per month offices along Enterprise Road to the National Sports Stadium.
An impeccable source at ZIFA indicated Wednesday that Kamambo had already made arrangements to move all operations and staff to the giant stadium over this coming weekend from its current base.
“Arrangements are already in place for the association to move its operations to offices at the National Sports Stadium because returning to ZIFA House is definitely out of the picture,” said the source.
“Returning to ZIFA House will mean that the association is bedevilled by debt collectors which I am sure is what Kamambo is fleeing from like Chiyangwa did when he took over from Cuthbert Dube.”
ZIFA’s January 2016 audit report revealed that one of Chiyangwa’s companies Hansporte Investments had been awarded a $50,000 tender to renovate and furnish ZIFA House.
ZIFA communications manager Xolisani Gwesela confirmed that they will be vacating Chiyangwa’s premises ‘soon’ but declined to confirm whether they were heading to the National Sports stadium.
“Yes, I can confirm that we will be leaving the Chisipite offices soon, but I am not yet in a position to share with you details of where we will be going from here, those will be shared in due course,” said Gwesela.
Chiyangwa moved the association’s headquarters from its 53 Livingstone, Harare offices in 2015 to his private Chisipite offices to flee the growing number of debtors seeking redress by ZIFA.
ZIFA debt ballooned from about $5 million to $8 million between 2015 and 2018 under Chiyangwa.
The flamboyant businessman was toppled in December by Kamambo who was part of his board until February 2017.
His ouster ended a turbulent three years at the helm of Zimbabwean football characterised by accusations of financial mismanagement, bribery, corruption and abuse of office.
Though there was massive approval from sections of Zimbabwe’s footballing circles who believed the ZANU PF Member of Parliament (MP) had personalised the association, very few people know about Kamambo.
The stadium Kamambo is moving the association to also houses the Footballers Union of Zimbabwe (FUZ) and premiership giants Dynamos on its Mezzanine Floor as well as the Sports and Recreation Commission (SRC) just behind the VIP area.
State Media