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Nyararai Sibanda

Petros Kausiyo Deputy Sports Editor
A Commission of Inquiry conducted by the Sport and Recreation has unearthed poor financial accountability, a poisoned working environment and revealed that a host of former Zimbabwe Rugby Union employees and officers continue to have control of the troubled association’s bank accounts.

Following a serious breakdown of relations between ZRU president Nyararai Sibanda and his deputy Noddy Kanyangarara, a crisis erupted at the Union and by the time the pair, together with treasurer Joseph Kanyetu were suspended, business had literally ground to a halt at the institution while the national teams were a sorry sight.

On Saturday, the ZRU held a special meeting at Prince Edward where they adopted the Sports Commission’s report and also endorsed the interim executive committee led by Russell Karimazondo, which was appointed by the supreme sports body. The other members of that committee are vice-presidents Tungamirai Mashungu (North) and Dave Nash (South), and former Sables international Aaron Jani who is the treasurer.

Chief executive Blessing Chiutare, general manager Sifiso Made and acting director of rugby Nsikelelo Sibanda complete the cast of the interim national executive committee. A brief statement from the ZRU confirmed the appointments of Karimazondo’s committee and revealed that the board had resolved to convene an elective special meeting next month in line with the directive they received from World Rugby and Africa Rugby.

“The meeting resolved to adopt the SRC Commission of Inquiry Report and an internal Report on governance.

l A vote of no confidence was tabled against the suspended National Executive Committee members and the vote was unanimous in favour of passing a vote of no confidence.

l A new National Executive Committee was appointed as follows — Russell Karimazondo (President), Tungamirai Mashungu (Vice president North), Dave Nash (Vice President South), Aaron Jani (Treasurer). Other members of the NEC — Blessing Chiutare (Chief Executive Officer), Nsikelelo Sibanda (Acting Director of Rugby) Sifiso Made (General Manager Development)

“The meeting resolved that an elective Special General Meeting will be held on 2nd December 2017. The board also authorised the National Executive to reactivate and /establish additional sub-committees to implement the recommendations of the SRC report with particular focus on:

l Human Resources Evaluation

l Technical Appointments

l Word Rugby Grant Audit

l Evaluation of Partnerships

l Establishment of a Disciplinary Committee

“The board authorised that the treasurer, the chief executive officer and a board member be signatories to the Zimbabwe Rugby Union bank account,’’ read part of the statement released by Chiutare.

But it is the 24-page report by the Commission which also pointed to embezzlement of funds and made shocking revelations of how such former employees like ex-chief executive Colleen De Jong have continued to pull the strings at the union and left the secretariat headed by Chiutare virtually powerless and mere figureheads

In their findings, the Commission’s probe team led by former Zimbabwe Cricket and ZRU administrator Titus Zvomuya, noted that the union’s leadership violated the lines that define governance and compliance among a hosts of transgressions, which also included failure to hold proper executive committee meetings and failure to have a national team’s selection policy.

“Financial stewardship and control are weak as evidenced by the fact that the former president John Falkenberg and the former CEO Colleen De Jong are still signatories to the ZRU Stanbic Bank accounts. There has been no board resolution to rectify that. Several former members have not been removed as signatories to the ZRU bank accounts, long after leaving office. They include Bruce Hobson, David Crouch, and Colleen De Jong who are signatories to the ZRU NMB bank account

“ZRU is officially running bank accounts with Stanbic bank but audit report revealed a secret bank account with NMB with the full panel of signatories being former employees or officers of ZRU. No income was declared or recorded in relation to sponsors or donors such as Old Mutual, who are known to be funding rugby development,’’ read part of the Zvomuya report.

The Commission also observed that there was no proper division of roles between the executive committee and the secretariat while relations with the presidency of the union was so strained that it affected management of the association.

“The secretariat had no direction at all since executive committee was not meeting. There was no co-ordination between the board and secretariat. There was no intra-board communication as presidium would not have common positions. There was no role differentiation between the president, his two vice-presidents and secretariat. In 2016 the ZRU CEO was forced to resign through antagonism by the vice president North Mr N Kanyangarara. She was also frustrated by the continued withdrawal of unauthorised trip funds by the president which funds she would sign for under protest.

“Immediately after the departure of the CEO the president (Nyararai Sibanda), without authorisation of the executive committee, assumed the role of CEO, thus he became operational and not accountable to anybody. There were several policies in place which were not followed at all by the presidium. In 2016 the ZRU employed a well experienced CEO but did not give him terms of reference and did not give him a contract.

“No handover take over was done and instructions would come to him separately from the two which at times would be contradicting. Up to the time of the enquiry the CEO had no contract of employment,’’ the Commission said.