Between the great mighty Zambezi and Limpopo rivers lies a pot shaped land called Zimbabwe.
It derives its name from the great stone wall structures found in the historical city of Masvingo. Born out of a bitter protracted armed liberation struggle, Zimbabwe was the jewel of Africa, as Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere remarked in his congratulatory message to the new republic in 1980.
The land of George mastermind Shaya, Shacky Tauro, Stanley Ndunduma, Freddy Mkwesha amongst many other pioneers of the game, the country has truly been blessed with great football talent.
The world’s most beautiful game as the late King of football Pele called it, has surely left its beautiful mark on the shores of Zimbabwe.
The late Freddy Mkwesha became the first footballer from Zimbabwe then Rhodesia to go ply his trade in Europe in 1966 when he was only 25 years old a year after the Unilateral Declaration of Independence in 1965 and the year the shots of the second Chimurenga were fired in then Sinoia present day Chinhoyi.
He turned out for Portuguese giants Sporting de Braga laying the foundation and attracting the football world’s attention to Zimbabwe football talent and rubbed shoulders in the same league with Portuguese world cup legend Eusebio who turned out for Benefica.
The national football team is still the most loved football team on the land. With the abovementioned generation diminishing came the 90s generation. The 90s generation was heralded by an exciting crop of players led by the great Peter Ndlovu.
The best to date in the nation’s history Peter was and is the first African footballer to play in the English premiership at age 16 in 1992 when he turned out for High field road giants Coventry City.
He would go on to become the longest serving African player in English football a mark of the great talent he was.
The 90s generation brought with it a crop of players to the national team dubbed The Dream Team led by German great Reinhard Fabisch.
It took its name from the USA national basketball team at the Barcelona Olympics of 1992 in Spain that had a stellar cast of NBA stars Michael Jordan, Irvin Magic Johnson, Scottie Pippen amongst others.
And to dub the national football team after such a stellar cast of icons shows how great this class was in their own Zimbabwean right.
The Ndlovu brothers lead by Madinda, the late Adam, and the most dazzling of all Peter, Agent Sawu, Vitalis Takawira, the late Paul Gundani, Henry Mckop, the late Benjamin Nkonjera, Ephraim Chawanda, Bruce Grobelaar, Norman Mapeza, Rahman Gumbo, the late Mercedes Sibanda, John Phiri, Francis Shonhai embodied everything the term jewel of Africa represented.
The team took no prisoners as they decimated the so-called giants of African football one after the other, which team came to Harare and left the giant national sports stadium in one piece the answer is none. With such fearlessness they put every team to the sword, and with that track record and the huge crowds the team attracted to the giant National sports stadium one would have thought that the authorities would have realized the socioeconomic value of the team but also the sociopolitical and sociocultural value.
The team had it all in diversity, I mean being coached a German national was in itself the first attribute to that. And for a country that still was reeling from the political disturbances early on in the 80s known as Gukurahundi, it was an opportunity for the country to unite under a common cause.
The climax of it all coming in 1994 when the national team came to 90 minutes away from qualifying for the FIFA world cup hosted in the United States of America. The giant killing, slaying of the Dream Team was billed for its finest hour of glory coupled with the passion Fabisch brought to the squad.
They put the indomitable lions to the sword in Harare in the first leg courtesy of a solitary goal from Agent Sawu and it is from this moment the crux of the article begins to unfold. I previously mentioned the relentless, perpetual failure to realize the socio developmental value of the national football team.
It all came to a head on the eve of the supposed finest hour, as preparations for the return leg were shambolic as the late gaffer Reinhard Fabisch narrated in an interview with Gary Tomson in 2001. As he narrated match officiating scandals aside the preparations didn’t show a nation that realized the moment of great pride that stood on the prospects.
Without going much into the intricacies, one wonders what kind of football administration we that does not appreciate the importance of good planning and preparations for such epic moments, that would have taken the nation to the biggest global football fiesta.
What would qualifying alone have done for the country that was still enjoying global affection? It would have been a good public relations gesture and for the players a chance to become immortals and showcase their talent on the grand stage. I mean with Agent Sawu finishing as second top scorer in the qualifiers shows the enormous talent the team was endored with.
What followed however was heartache as it was a case of so near yet so far as they lost the 2nd leg 3-1 in Yaoundé Cameroun on October 10 ,1993. The government of the day didn’t move an inch to assist, or make things easier leaving everything to the soccer mother body that has been continuously run by clueless so-called football administrators.
Without support from the biggest stakeholder coupled with mediocre preparations failure to qualify robbed the immaculate generation of a chance to showcase their talent on the global scene. The global audience was robbed so was elite football clubs across the globe of an opportunity to see that there is more from where Peter Ndlovu came from who dazzling in what is still the best league in the world.
The shambolic administration of football has been evident in the failure by ZIFA to run football in a way that that brings commercial value making organizations jostle for partnerships with the national team. I mean who would want to be associated with mediocrity.
It has been unabated that whenever its international duty time for players they have not been paid their monies as is practice across the football world. Were it not for the heroics of the great Peter Ndlovu who on several would bail out the soccer and pay staff and colleagues alike one wonders would any player have heeded the call to come play for the national team.
In all this chaos were was the government through the ministry of education, sport and culture as it was then. Aren’t national team football players civil servants enough to be paid by the state on that sacred duty of representing the nation with pride on the football field. Is it not national cause enough because its football when these players put on kits with the national emblem and colors and proudly sing the national anthem on foreign turf.
The maladministration has been unabated and has somewhat mirrored the failed leadership and governance the country continues to endure. When the country finally booked a berth at Africa’s soccer showcase the African cup of Nations held in Tunisia 2004 there was talk that went round that football lovers should fundraise money in order for the team to travel. What levels of Mayhem preparations and where was the government that a national team has to call on such support in the first place.
All those questions point to one answer maladministration and the unwillingness of the government of te day to support issues that have to do with socio-development of the nation. The climax of the maladministration has come in so many lows for national football and the above-mentioned incidences is just a snippet of the many shenanigans that have bedeviled the game.
The many so-called football trips the national took to the sub-continent and southeast Asia in Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand turned out to be a match-fixing extravaganza which came to be known as Asia gate and Henrietta as chief executive officer of the local football motherboard was leading from the front. And coincidentally she has been recently implicated in a gold-smuggling scam in a documentary published by Al Jazeera.
And to think such an individual at one time one a chief protagonist in the affairs of national football beats the mind and how incompetent is the government of the day that fails to keep track of what the national team would be doing when they flyout to compete in matches where they are purportedly said to be representing the nation.
The brains behind and the simple act of throwing off games was enough to warrant treason charges against the actors, I am not a legal practitioner but if a crime against the state is charged as treason, then Henrietta Rushwaya and the many accomplices should have brought before the courts of law.
As if that was not enough the decay has shown itself in the hiring of foreign coaches by the local football mother board and in return failing to pay these coaches invoking stiff penalties from the world governing body of football FIFA. Case in point when Zimbabwe was expelled from participating in the preliminary qualifiers of the 2018 FIFA world cup hosted in the Russian Federation.
Failure to pay one Jose Claudinei Georgini invoked such a penalty from FIFA and for a government that has splashed huge amounts of money on nondevelopment things you wonder how they let such a thing happen, that not only soils the image of the nation but also robs the nation of whining and dinning with other countries in a spirit of oneness and sportsmanship.
Next was Belgian Tom Saintfiet who also logged a complaint to FIFA about outstanding salaries he was owed by ZIFA and to think this gentleman never sat in the dugout giving instructions to players on the field boggles the mind.
International football is currently in session with the international break and football lovers mourn the state of football which has seen Zimbabwe banned from international participation because of government involvement with the suspension of the ZIFA board led by Felton Kamambo. However, CAF (Confederation of African Football) has given the country a reprieve and can participate in continental competitions.
Then again you question CAF’s decision to accommodate Zimbabwe when the state of football is shambolic, food for thought.
