Sports administrators accused of destroying sports by taking more money

Zanu PF Senator Tapera Machingaifa has accused the country's sports administrators for taking a lot of money in their payouts at the expense of layers who are sweating always to entertain the nation.

"It is there for us as the people of Zimbabwe to be self driven in sporting activities so that we can see how we can improve on sports for it to develop," he said.

"Sports in this country wants us as a people to plan properly because sports is like a dam which has to feed water into all catchments. So, sporting activities should be supported and it will develop."

He said although those who are engaging in sporting are not getting anything from the Government, even when he was growing up, when he used to play around with those plastic balls, they used to pretend to be Peter Nyama, George Shaya, James Khumalo, Chieza, the likes of DD and some stadiums like Gwanzura and Rufaro.

"At that time Madam President, the country was stable, we could see companies that were interested in sporting activities that would accompany national teams wherever they would go," he said.

"This motion was raised because the Mighty Warriors of Zimbabwe, when they wanted to go out of the country, they were told there were no resources. The warriors also tried to do the same, again it was the same story that there were no resources. When games are played, the stadia will be full of people but the footballer does not get enough money. The administrators are the ones who get more money and that destroys the motivation of the players."

The senator said long ago, those who were playing for the country generally came from Chamber of Mines; those were the times of John Madzima and Chirwa as administrators.

"Also during that time, the likes of John Nxumalo would go around doing road shows with tobacco companies, putting on their football teams' regalia. When these companies were functional, the Government was not facing any problems," he said.

"These sportspersons would come from their companies and their companies would support them. When they played for the national team, they were not after money because they would be working somewhere. Right now, that is not the case, they only play football for survival. You will see that even our media do not talk about our local teams only."

Machingaifa said every day they talk of Manchester City, Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal and all those English soccer teams.

"They do not talk of the likes of Harare City, Dynamos, Highlanders and the like," he said.

"Football was played in this country; sport needs to be planned for. If you look at those who are trained in the medical field, they make sure that there is a mortuary in place at a hospital because they know death is certain. If you go at places of n'angas and prophets, there are no mortuaries because they think that they can stop death. That is wrong planning. Those people in ZIFA, do they know the risk of football in the country?"