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FRIEND OF THE WARRIORS . . . Saidi Sangula, the former Zifa board member, watches the Warriors in their 2013 Nations Cup final qualifier against Angola in Luanda in 2012.

Robson Sharuko Senior Sports Editor—
l Ex-Board member questions Electoral Committee composition
l Challenges Sports Commission to intervene and stop process
A FORMER Zifa board member, Saidi Sangula, has petitioned the Sports Commission for an urgent intervention to stop elections, which are being held in various structures of the national football controlling body, amid sensational claims that the process is being conducted under a flawed and fraudulent regime.

Sangula, a Harare lawyer who replaced Solomon Mugavazi on the Zifa board in 2011 by virtue of his position as acting chairman of the Zifa Northern Region, has an interest in participating in the elections but hasn’t revealed the post he is eyeing.

He claims in his petition that the Electoral Committee, set by the association to conduct elections, was not duly constituted and its current membership structure was in clear violation of the new Zifa constitution.

The elections in the various Zifa structures, which will culminate with the polls for the board members and president on March 29, are being held under the auspices of the new Zifa constitution that was lodged and registered with the Sports Commission on November 18 last year.

In that same month, Zifa president Cuthbert Dube unveiled an 11-member Electoral Committee, whose mandate was the organisation and supervision of all football election processes for the next four years, under the leadership of former Premier Soccer League boss, Tendai Madzorera, who also served as a vice-president of the association.

Zifa lawyer, Ralph Maganga, is also a member of the Electoral Committee.
Fifa directed that all elections in football be run by an Electoral Committee established in terms of the Fifa Electoral Code and Zifa, in amendments made in their new constitution, made provision for the committee and the people who were qualified to be its members.
Sangula claims in his petition to the Sports Commission that the membership of the Electoral Committee, who have been running the elections that started at area zone levels, was flawed in that it was in violation of the new constitution that the association were using as a bible to not only guide their process, but also give it legitimacy, and everything that was being done was null and void.

The Harare lawyer says the new Zifa Constitution, and the attendant Electoral Code that deals with this subject, are very clear that “only members of Zifa” can be members of that Electoral Committee and, given the description given by Article 10 of the new Constitution of who can be called a member of Zifa, a number of the people on the Electoral Committee do not qualify for such membership.

Sangula argues that an Electoral Committee, whose membership structure is in violation of the Zifa Constitution, cannot be allowed to conduct the elections without bringing the entire exercise into disrepute and he wants the Sports Commission to intervene and bring a stop to the entire process until all the organs, especially the one conducting the pools, falls in line with the Constitution.

If Sangula’s petition is upheld, it could throw the whole election process into turmoil as all the results, from the area zones to the regions which held their elections at the weekend, could be deemed null and void.

“I am made to understand that contrary to my earlier belief that the 2013 Zifa Constitution had not been registered, it was actually so registered on the 18th of November 2013,” Sangula claims in his petition to Sports Commission director-general, Charles Nhemachena.
“However, and in flagrant disregard of the provisions of the said Constitution and the attendant Electoral Code, an Electoral Committee was set up which does (not) comply with the law as set up by Zifa itself.

“Article 3 of the Code clearly states that only members of Zifa shall constitute the Electoral Committee. Article 10 of the Constitution itself does describe who (are) the members of Zifa.

“Although there is a provision for a natural person to apply to be a member (of Zifa such an application must meet the stated requirements and the membership would only become effective on admission by Congress.

“Sadly, for football, the people conducting the elections now are, therefore, not members of Zifa and not qualified to hold the offices they are holding. As provided by Article 3 (3) ‘the members of the Electoral Committee shall be bona fide members of Zifa’.

“It cannot be said with any seriousness that the (Electoral) Committee of Messrs Tendai Madzorera, retired High Court Judge Justice Kennedy Sibanda, Labour Court President, Hon. Sello Nare, Musekiwa Mbanje, Tinofara Hove, Tichawana Nyahuma, Ralph Maganga, Charles Sibanda and Madam Elizabeth Banda are members of Zifa as defined by the Constitution and were installed by the Zifa Congress.
Banda is a Fifa instructor but Sangula is questioning the status of Sibanda, Nare and lawyers Mbanje, Hove and Nyahuma and how they can qualify to be called members of Zifa.

“This is moreso when one reads Article 3 (3) together with Article 5 (6). Even assuming the Congress did, indeed, install them, such an installation would be wrong and unconstitutional. Therefore the whole process is tainted with illegality.”
Sangula wants the Sports Commission to intervene urgently.

“I make the appeal to the SRC as the supreme body that manages and supervises sports associations in Zimbabwe and in a bid to avoid going to Court for redress,” says Sangula in his petition.

“Going by history, an appeal to Zifa itself would not yield results and going to Fifa would require that I exhaust all available domestic remedies.

“Provincial and Regional elections have already been held using this flawed process and the next election is for the National Women and Premier Soccer League slated for the 9th of March 2014 before the Zifa Board elections on the (29th of March 2014) and it is my intention to be a candidate for the available Zifa posts,

“This matter requires your most urgent attention and I have copied this letter to the Ministry of Sport, Arts and Culture for their information.”

Sangula is also up in arms over the fees being used for the polls and, attaches an e-mail, which was sent to him from Zifa advising that a significant reduction would be effected only for him to realise, later, that this wasn’t the case.

“I note from the newspaper reports that following the meeting of the (SRC) Board on the 11th of December 2013, the Sports and Recreation Commission ‘advised’ that the fees for participating in these elections be reduced to those prevailing in 2010,” says Sangula in his petition.

“Despite the advise Zifa has, to the best of my knowledge, gone ahead to conduct the elections with figures way above that, especially for Regional, Premier Soccer league and the main Zifa Board. This is even more disturbing when one considers that the revision of the fees was done for those that had made certain deposits shutting out those who had been closed out by the high figures (I attach hereto an e-mail from Zifa for reference).

“If this does not vitiate the whole electoral process then nothing does. Clearly, a fraud was perpetrated on the football public and SRC must intervene to save the process.”