Innocent Kurira
FORMER Zifa vice president Vincent Pamire says politicians must stay in their lane and not encroach into football matters where they have become a menace.
Pamire was speaking during the Ndumiso Gumede memorial service held at the Bulawayo Amphitheatre on Monday.
The former Zifa boss, who worked closely with the late Gumede, tore into politicians accusing them of being the root cause of the chaos in Zimbabwean football.
Over the years the football fraternity has tried to pinpoint the major cause for the deteriorating standards of the game in the country, but nothing has been done to rescue the situation.
From blaming administrators, failing to come up with proper development structures, to the country not having proper facilities, one wonders which one is really the cause of the country’s decline.
While at that, Pamire has added to the reasons behind the beautiful game suffering.
“We as Africans have one disease. When things start moving well, there is a lot of interference. And those that interfere bring a lot of confusion and that is exactly what happened and the people that threw spanners into the country’s football are politicians,” said Pamire.
“This is a true story, don’t trust politicians in sports.
“During our time they started using us as a scapegoat for their failures. It’s true we had friends in football who assisted us financially and when we were there as Zifa, our players never went without remuneration.
“How many times did we clinch the Cosafa Cup? And we ended up qualifying for the Africa Cup of Nations, a feat we had never achieved, but politics killed us,” Pamire added.
Pamire also showered praises on Gumede whom he says was instrumental in improving the standards of the game in Zimbabwe.
Gumede was instrumental in securing Highlanders the properties they pride themselves in, with the other ones being the Robert Mugabe Way offices and the Luveve camping house popularly known as ‘Hotel California’.
Besides serving Highlanders with distinction as chairman, chief executive officer, board member and president,
Gumede also once served Zifa as a committee member, vice-president, secretary-general and chief executive officer.
