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Leonard Ncube Victoria Falls Reporter
Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) president Aleksander Ceferin, who is in the country on holiday, is expected to meet Government officials next week.

Government is hosting a dinner for him next Monday.

The UEFA boss, who is also Fifa vice president, is being hosted by Cosafa president Mr Philip Chiyangwa.

He will end his tour of the country with a meeting with Government officials.

“The UEFA president will be hosted by Government on the 6th before he departs. We are leaving Victoria Falls for Harare to start preparing for the function while he continues with his itinerary as he is supposed to visit Binga and Hwange,” said Chiyangwa yesterday.

The Slovenian lawyer-cum-businessman and wife Barbara arrived in the country on Friday with a delegation of 20 people comprising mostly family members including his three daughters Nina (26), Neza (17) and Ana (14).

They sampled several activities in Victoria Falls before leaving for Hwange yesterday where they are expected to tour Hwange National Park and Binga.

The two football leaders have been having private discussions on possible areas of cooperation in football, although both haven’t opened up on the details.

Ceferin has said he is keen to explore areas of cooperation towards development of sports tourism, saying Victoria Falls has potential to attract international clubs for off-season training and friendlies.

While in Victoria Falls, Ceferin toured the Rainforest and also did bungee jumping, helicopter flight and jet boat cruise.

He said he was excited to have seen the Falls.

“We had been told that it’s dry, but we have seen that it’s not. In fact, it’s water everywhere, it’s flowing,” he said.

This is despite recent reports by BBC’s Stephen Sackur that the falls are dry.

Ceferin has been to Namibia, Botswana, Tunisia and Tanzania, among other African countries.

From Hwange and Binga, Ceferin and his delegation will proceed to Matopos National Park, Great Zimbabwe and Vumba Mountains.

Ceferin took over as the Uefa boss in September 2016. He was voted sports personality of the year in the same year by Slovenian sports newspaper Ekipa SN, in a poll of newspaper journalists and readers.

In January 2019, SportsPro Media included Ceferin in the list of the most influential people in the sports industry. The UEFA president was also selected as one of the people of 2018 by the influential World Soccer magazine.