Zimpapers Logo

AT times, during that moving ceremony, it was hard to keep the tears in check as the power of television brought the funeral service of Senzo Meyiwa into our living rooms last Saturday as South Africa bade farewell a Bafana Bafana skipper whose smile will charm us forever.

In that magnificent stadium, even the heavens appeared to be crying with them for an athlete gunned down in the prime of his career, silenced by a bullet in a violent society where thugs with guns find it fashionable to kill.

Each drop of rain seemed to be vainly trying to wash away the sins of a nation that had just spent more than a year-and-half, searching its soul in the midst of the high-profile gunning down of one of its celebrity beauty queens by her high-profile boyfriend, a world-famous athlete, only to be rocked by Senzo’s senseless murder.

But this wasn’t a day to judge South Africa for her sins, for a violent gun culture that turns this society into a demon that devours its children, including its young sporting ambassadors who would have toiled in the jungles of Brazzaville, the fortress of Lubumbashi and the suffocating heat of Khartoum, flying their national flag and making the world see a better, and beautiful side, of their country.

This was about mourning with them, for the loss of someone we knew quite well, and admired for the leadership qualities he had shown, for leading the revival of his country’s hitherto dormant national football team, at a time when we have been crying for an inspirational leader to drag our sleeping Warriors out of their slumber.

This was about joining the Meyiwa family in mourning their child, their Senzo, their son, their brother, their cousin, and we felt the magnitude of their loss when his sister courageously addressed the crowd at the Moses Mabhida Stadium, every word she uttered coated in pain that might never heal, every sentence she completed leaving questions that might never be answered.

“Why Always Me?” Mario Balotelli had asked the world, looking for answers that would never come, “Why Us?” the Meyiwa family might have been asking in their grieving hearts, “Why Did It Have To Be Our Senzo?” and “Why Now?” when he had finally made his breakthrough after years of toiling for that big break.

When he was finally being repaid for all the patience that made him wait for his moment, both at Orlando Pirates, where for long he was in the shadow of Moneeb Josephs, and at Bafana Bafana, where Itumeleng Khune’s injury opened a window for him not only to be the first-choice ‘keeper but to be the skipper.

Here were the South Africans showing us how to mourn one of your sporting heroes, shaming us for treating Eddie Chitato as if he was an outcast, when his heart ailment needed our helping hand to help him live longer, when his funeral needed the presence of our football community, which sadly went into hiding, to provide it with the dignity it deserved.

An entire stadium filled with more than 30 000 grieving people, on a sombre day when club affiliation was dissolved in the tears that accompanied every step made by that funeral procession, an entire city briefly dumping its romantic and traditional affiliation with its local team Amazulu to cry for a lost Pirate and a nation united by its grief to have the strength to see that, even in this game eternally shaped by rivalry, there is more than unites than divides us.

The touching moment, for me, came when the big screen at the Moses Mabhida began to screen the images of Senzo, so full of life as he commanded his troops, so passionate about this game that meant so much to him, and all those who believed in him to invest their trust in not only his golden gloves but his leadership qualifies, suddenly his big smile lit the somber atmosphere, a painful and powerful reminder of what we will miss now that we were going to leave him six feet underground.

Even his father, who had distinguished himself with his calmness throughout the proceedings, could not hold back the tears, and sank his face into his arms as time, for a moment, stood still and those motion pictures being beamed inside a stadium where his son had made his name, brought back a flood of memories of the time when they represented a light that illuminated his life, and from a distance I heard Mike and The Mechanics singing, their hit song “The Living Years”, and every word, every verse, appeared written for this man, for this occasion:

“I WASN’T THERE THAT EVENING

WHEN MY SON PASSED AWAY

I DIDN’T GET TO TELL HIM

ALL THE THINGS I HAD TO SAY

“I THINK I CAUGHT HIS SPIRIT

LATER THAT SAME YEAR

I’M SURE I HEARD HIS ECHO

IN MY BABY’S NEW BORN TEARS

I JUST WISH I COULD HAVE TOLD HIM IN THE LIVING YEARS

“SAY IT LOUD, SAY IT CLEAR

YOU CAN LISTEN, AS WELL AS YOU HEAR

IT’S TOO LATE WHEN WE DIE

TO ADMIT WE DON’T SEE EYE TO EYE.”

SO MANY LESSONS FOR US, SO MANY QUESTIONS FOR US

As the ceremony, which was beamed live on eNCA, Africa News Network7 and SABC News, went on for the better part of Saturday, a good number of Zimbabweans were watching, following every angle of the broadcast, touched by the images being broadcast live from Durban, consumed by the sights and sounds of what was on their television screens.

Along the way scores of Whatsapp and text messages flooded my phone from people who had read my blog last week, asking why we never hold our heroes in such high esteem, wondering if our football leaders were also watching and picking some big lessons, questioning why we turned our back on Chitato.

And why we never cared to remember that in March, this year, the clock marked the 10th anniversary of the year Blessing “Yogo Yogo” Makunike, Shingi Arlon and Gary Mashoko died in the line of duty.

Wellington Chando, a former CAPS United secretary-general, was one of those who were watching the live broadcast of Meyiwa’s funeral and texted me to say that he was surprised with the way domestic football, in general, and the Green Machine, in particular, had treated Steve Kwashi, their championship-winning coach, since he was badly injured in a car crash in 2001.

Kwashi, just like Yogo Yogo, was in the line of duty, coming from a league match in Hwange, when the truck he was travelling in veered off the road, crashed into a tree and left him in a coma for several months and when he emerged out of it he started experiencing memory loss, struggled for speech and other routine activities like walking.

He hasn’t worked, in his state of permanent physical disability, since that road accident and, Chando noted, our football just remembered him for the first few weeks and then moved on, just like that, as if he was another ordinary man.

No, Kwashi isn’t an ordinary man or coach.

There have only been three coaches who have guided CAPS United to their four league titles in the club’s 41-year-history and Kwashi belongs to that group — having created an awesome attacking machine in 1996, which dominated domestic football in a manner that was as ruthless as it was attractive.

He became the first man to end the myth, after Independence, that CAPS United were not a club that could win league titles, something that those very good Green Machine sides, at the turn of the millennium had failed to do despite having an abundance of talent, and 16 years after we attained our freedom, he led his men into the glory fields.

But, despite all that phenomenal achievement, Kwashi remains a forgotten man, and as Chando watched South Africa remember its departed football star, he wondered why we were so cruel that we could forget a living legend who not only made his mark at CAPS United but played for Dynamos and Zimbabwe Saints and turned Black Aces into a Premiership side once again.

He is not the only one, even though he might be the prominent one, scores of others have been forgotten, left to face their fate by an evil football community that quickly turns its back on its stars and, even in death, as what happened to Chitato, they found out that they had no true friends.

MAYBE WE NEED OUR NIGHT OF TURN AROUND

Prophet Walter Magaya of the PHD Ministries held his mega all-night prayer session, dubbed the “Night of Turn Around” and when the prophet walked to the podium last night, to a thunderous greeting from the biggest crowd to converge at such a spiritual gathering in this country, I was still in the office and watching the events live on ZBC.

He has his special gift, this young prophet, and as I saw the events that exploded, once he started his opening prayer, I got this feeling that our football is weighed down by some evil spirits and the entire community needed to have been part of that huge crowd for us to be healed, too, because we seem to carry a heavy burden.

Magaya is not a stranger to our football and has actually injected US$30 000 of his money into our national game, through his Yadah TV Knock-out Cup competition, and at the unveiling of the competition, he said he was concerned about the evil spirits that stalk our game.

Maybe, it’s those spirits that are blinding us from seeing what the other football communities, like those in South Africa, are doing, when it comes to taking care of their own while we turn our backs on those who served our game well, like Kwashi, and were unfortunate to be dealt such a heavy blow by fate while on their tour of duty.

WE SHOULD CONCEDE THE ENGLISH PREMIERSHIP IS A COUNTER-ATTRACTION

Today, at around the same time that the biggest football game to be played in this country will kick-off at the National Sports Stadium, Liverpool will be taking on Chelsea in an English Premiership blockbuster showdown.

This means that a number of fans will simply choose to either remain at home, and watch a little bit of our game and a little bit of the English Premiership, or some will go to the sports bars, where they have many television sets, and they can watch our game on one television and the English Premiership on another television set.

Why should we compete against these teams when we could have fixtured our big game for tomorrow when there are no counter attractions?

I think our football leadership should stamp their foot when it comes to this because we need the fans in our stadiums.

THE COACH THEY WANTED TO GIVE US

Free State Stars confirmed on Thursday that they had parted ways with head coach Tom Saintfiet, the man they brought here to coach the Warriors in the 2012 Nations Cup qualifiers, after a poor run of results.

“Free State Stars FC has mutually terminated its contract with coach Tom Saintfiet who joined the club in the 2014-2015 season,” club general manager Rantsi Mokoena said in a statement.

“We have had a meeting with the coach and both parties agreed that after a string of poor results it would be best for both parties to part ways in an effort to try and remedy the current situation.”

He guided them in 10 games, they won three, drew two and lost five and this was the man they wanted to take us to the Promised Land.

Surely, we need our night of turn around.

To God Be The Glory!

Come on United!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Di Mariaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

Text Feedback — 0772545199

WhatsApp Messenger – 0772545199

Email — [email protected]

Skype — sharuko58

• Like my new Facebook page, ROBSON SHARUKO JOURNALIST, follow me on Twitter @Chakariboy, interact with me on Viber and on ZBC’s weekly television football magazine programme, GamePlan on Monday nights, or read my material in The Southern Times.