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Munetsi confirms shadowy deal
By Robson Sharuko
DYNAMOS chairman Farai Munetsi has confirmed that his club received a controversial offer for a US$400 000 aid package — from a group of middlemen claiming to be representing wealthy Congolese businessman Moise Katumbi — and revealed that their decision to turn it down was a triumph for the conscience of his leadership.
There were reports last night that the DeMbare executive will be writing to club board chairman Richard Chiminya demanding that chief executive Casper Muzenda should be sanctioned for his role in the plot for the cash-strapped Glamour Boys to get offshore funding from Katumbi.
Muzenda was scheduled to have been one of the Dynamos representatives who were expected to fly out of Harare on Wednesday for the trip to the Democratic Republic of Congo to finalise details of the US$400 000 aid package.
There has been an uneasy relationship between the DeMbare executive and some members of the board, of late, amid concerns within the club’s frontline structure of administration that there was increasing interference from the board in the day-to-day running of the country’s biggest football club.
The fact that Muzenda appeared ready to travel to Lubumbashi, with a former Dynamos chairman who was to be disguised as the team’s incumbent boss and fill into Munetsi’s shoes simply because of his close links with Katumbi, has also created deep divisions between the chief executive and the executive committee.
The Herald broke the story on Saturday that a group of middlemen — two Zimbabwean businessmen working in tandem with Malawian football consultant Felix Sapao — approached the Dynamos board on Monday last week claiming that they had an offer for an aid package from Moise to help DeMbare fulfil four of its remaining Champions League assignments.
Moise owns defending African champions TP Mazembe who beat Dynamos 2-0 at the National Sports Stadium in the first match of the mini-league phase.
The Glamour Boys have been reeling from serious financial challenges and the middlemen claimed that Moise — who wants a very competitive Dynamos in the group rather than a punching bag that will donate points to Algeria’s Entente Sportive and Esperance of Tunisia — was ready to give DeMbare an unconditional grant.
Dynamos were scheduled to receive US$100 000 for each of their four games (two home and two away) against Entente and Esperance.
Munetsi said at the weekend his leadership believes their decision to turn down the offer was not only professional but also a commitment to their fans — who back their cause — that the Glamour Boys were an institution that still valued the ethics of Fair Play even during trying financial times.
"We believe that we did the right thing, not only for the sake of our players and the fans, but also for the integrity of this institution called Dynamos that was built over the last 40 years by principled men who, at times, did not get any cent for their efforts," said Munetsi.
"There was absolutely everything wrong about that package because it would have compromised Dynamos when we still have a game to play against TP Mazembe and you don’t want to send your players into a battle where they will be playing against their paymaster.
"We lost the first game but that does not mean we should dump our professionalism because we still have a chance and we can also win away from home and we should do it as Dynamos rather than with the help of someone else, especially a club that happens to be our opponents.
"Our executive feels that we made the right decision, despite the financial challenges that we are facing right now as a club, and we have put in other measures to try and raise funds for the expensive away trips."
Dynamos will travel to Tunisia this week for a date against Esperance.
The 46-year-old Katumbi, who is also the Governor of the mineral-rich Katanga province of the Democratic Republic of Congo and a member of the Confederation of African Football Marke-ting Commission, owns reigning African club football champions TP Mazembe and is a rich businessman with vast interests in mining and transport in his country.
No official comment is yet to be obtained from either Katumbi or TP Mazembe.
But the shadowy scheme could taint the image of TP Mazembe, who are one of the richest clubs on the continent and are the defending club champions, in a tournament that has always been blighted by allegations that it does not promote the spirit of Fair Play amid concerns that some of the clubs use their financial weight to get favourable results.
Sapao, who is the local agent of French television marketing company SportFive that holds the broadcasting rights of the African Champions League, also has very close links to TP Mazembe and worked as part of their backroom staff during their successful Champions League campaign last year.
He was a key figure in brokering the deals that took a number of Monomotapa players from their base in Harare for a stint at TP Mazembe at the beginning of the year and was also at the National Sports Stadium on Sunday where he was part of the five-man team that accompanied Katumbi, under heavy security and police guard, into the dressing rooms at half-time.
Sapao runs a company called Digital Arts Media and Sports, which is based in Malawi’s commercial capital Blantyre, but now spends most of his time in Harare which he has turned into a convenient base for his business transactions that are primarily based on football across the continent.
Last Monday he teamed up with two Harare businessmen, including a former Dynamos chairman, and went to Chiminya’s office in the capital where they dangled a US$400 000 carrot, wrapped as an aid package, to help the Glamour Boys — who are struggling to raise funds to bankroll their Champions League campaign — fulfil four of their remaining five matches in the tournament.
The meeting was also attended by Dynamos board vice-chairman Freddie Mkwesha and the club’s chief executive officer Casper Muzenda.
The three middlemen claimed that they had an offer, from Katumbi, to help Dynamos with a package that would ease their financial stress and help the Glamour Boys focus on their remaining matches.
Sources said Katumbi played the same card last year when he allegedly offered Monomotapa a cash payment to help them cover their costs and make them focus on their final Champions League tie against Heartland of Nigeria — a result which was key in deciding who tops the group and avoids the winner of the other group — which the Zimbabwean team won 2-1 at Rufaro.
On Monday, the focus apparently shifted to Dynamos and sources at the club revealed that the initial meeting at Chiminya’s office resulted in a decision being passed for a DeMbare delegation to travel to Lubumbashi on Wednesday where they would be handed their US$400 000 package.
Dynamos’ match against TP Mazembe, either in Kinshasa or Lubumbashi, was not covered by the deal.
Muzenda, club secretary-general Oliver Manyau and a man who was supposed to travel as Dynamos chairman, filling in the shoes of incumbent executive boss Munetsi, were tasked with flying to the DRC on Wednesday and then returning home on Friday.
Tickets for their travel were immediately booked with a Harare travel agency and the trip was sanctioned.
The following day things changed.
The Dynamos executive, headed by Munetsi, met in the capital to review their Champions League loss to TP Mazembe and the DeMbare chairman advised his fellow executive members that some of the board members, notably Robson Rundaba and Bernard Marriot, were strongly against the planned trip.
Munetsi felt that such a gesture compromised Dynamos, not only in the eyes of their fans, but also in the eyes of the sponsors who were backing their cause, and — given that they still had an outstanding match against TP Mazembe — accepting the money would be tantamount to throwing away that game long before it had been played.
The executive then resolved to reject the offer and called Chiminya advising him to either cancel the proposed trip or they would resign en-masse.
At that point Chiminya advised them that, after scrutinising the offer at length, he had also decided that it was not good for the club and had already made a decision to cancel the trip.
But the Dynamos executive members still felt that their players remained vulnerable, either given their links to agents involved or associated to the people who had acted as middlemen, and felt that by initially accepting the offer on Monday, the board had erred badly and compromised their players who could still be approached clandestinely given the financial challenges facing the club.
Sapao flew to Lubumbashi from Harare on Friday but not before demanding the money that he used to book the tickets, for the cancelled fight, for the three Dynamos representatives.
He also sent an e-mail to Manyau expressing his displeasure at the sudden turn of events.
"It is quite unfortunate that your executive chairman didn’t want you guys to travel to DR Congo. Club politics," wrote Sapao on Thursday.
"I spoke with Governor Katumbi yesterday and the amount he was offering for the games and Esperance and Satif (both home and away) was US$100 000 per game (total US$400 000).
"He (Katumbi) says that (there) are no second chances for offers from him."
Dynamos have since approached a leading local bank for a loan to help them foot their expensive trip to Tunisia. |
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