Rushwaya in Europe last week as they continued investigations into the Asiagate saga, in particular, and match-fixing around the world.
Rushwaya spent three days at an undisclosed location in Europe, discussing a number of issues related to Asiagate saga, at the invitation of the Fifa investigations team. The world football governing body footed the entire bill for her trip.

The Herald can exclusively reveal that Eaton and his investigation team, led by Terence Steans, met Rushwaya in Europe just two days before Fifa president Joseph Sepp Blatter held an executive meeting at Fifa House in Zurich on Friday, also looking into corruption issues rocking the global game.
Sources revealed that the Fifa team felt they needed to also hear from Rushwaya, named by the report prepared by Ndumiso Gumede and his investigating team as one of the ring leaders of the Asiagate scam, given that the report does not provide her side of the story.

Rushwaya confirmed she met Fifa but refused to give details, referring everything to Eaton.
“Yes, I had a meeting with them and that’s all I can say. What has become so important now for you guys to want my side of story?
“My discussions with Fifa are none of anyone’s business. Whoever I meet and wherever is none of anyone’s business but if you really want to know that I met Fifa, yes, and I did that in Europe.
“Since when has my private business become a public pursuit? Whatever I discussed with Eaton and comapny, he is the one who has the details because he is the one who invited me there and, more importantly I do not run a football office, so get Eaton on the phone and get the details,” said Rushwaya.

Eaton confirmed to The Herald that they met Rushwaya in Europe but refused to say where exactly.
“Yes, we met Henrietta and like I promised during my last visit to Zimbabwe in September, we continue to investigate the Asiagate scandal and surely we can ask whoever we feel can be of assistance to us,” Eaton said.

He, however, refused to discuss any details of the meeting or the ongoing investigations saying:
“The details of the operational investigations can not be discussed publicly, whoever does that jeopardises the exercise.
“However, I can confirm that we met with the former CEO of Zifa, Henrietta Rushwaya, and that the international and trans-continental aspects of what you in Zimbabwe call ‘Asiagate’ are of particular importance to Fifa”.

But we can reveal that what prompted Eaton to arrange a meeting with Rushwaya were the details gleaned from some Asian football Associations submissions during Fifa’s mission – a task taken straight after meeting the Gumede-led committee at which the pair of Eaton and Steans addressed media at a local hotel.
Eaton needed to present a report regarding the match fixing, not only in Zimbabwe but in other nations around the world, before the Fifa executive meeting last Friday.

The Fifa security boss needed some key details, not contained in the Zifa report, and felt Rushwaya could provide that assistance.
Investigations have revealed that Eaton was presented with a very informative report by the Finnish Police, who were instrumental in the capture and subsequent imprisonment of Wilson Raj Perumal.
The Finnish police report indicated that some matches could have been fixed to benefit the betting companies at the behest of Perumal, who also worked for a wealthy Chinese businessman.

But what the report could not answer were questions about Zimbabwe and the Zifa report could also not provide the breakthrough that Fifa wanted.
So it was always going to be crucial for anyone investigating the matter to get verifiable details, which in turn helped to shed the entire puzzle, as Fifa battle to clean the house.

Fifa, who have a properly constituted arm to handle such matters and have the financial muscle to go with it, invited Rushwaya, whom they believe was key to get details which could assist in the matter – a global web involving a lot of people, most of whom wealthy. Rushwaya’s meeting with Eaton, ahead of a Fifa executive meeting last Friday at which a big decision was made to re-open files of the 2001 International

Sport and Leisure corruption scandal, was a massive coup for the world football governing body’s security department.
Critics will probably also view this as a big indicator of the shortcomings of the Gumede Asiagate report since the Fifa investigating team, upon completing studying the voluminous report, felt there was need to still host Rushwaya and speak to her on a number of issues.

Although the Zifa investigating team concluded that Rushwaya was one of the central figures in the Asiagate scam, their second report does not question her on the allegations raised in the report.
While Rushwaya appeared before Gumede’s committee last year, the questions were all centred on a single trip taken by the Warriors to Singapore and Malaysia in December 2009. When Gumede and his team

were given an extended mandate to take their probe beyond the 2009 trip, they didn’t see the need to conduct further interviews with Rushwaya.
Last week Fifa decided that there were a number of grey areas and decided to speak with Rushwaya at an undisclosed location in Europe.

On Monday, Zifa unveiled an Independent Disciplinary Committee, led by retired Supreme Court judge, Justice Ahmed Ebrahim, to conduct hearings for individuals implicated in the Asiagate scam.
The seven-member team also has lawyers, Lewis Uriri, who will be prosecuting, Tererai Gunje and John Reid-Rowland, former Sports Commission chairman, Gibson Mashingaidze, former Fifa referee Kenny Sigoba and former ZRP Assistant Commissioner Emmaneul Chimwanda.

Sources have indicated that Fifa will have a big say in the operations of this committee.

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