SHATTERED DREAM

Tadious Manyepo Sports Reporter

ZIMBABWEAN sport was yesterday left reeling from a shattered dream for a number of budding athletes after the Zimbabwe Olympic Committee let slip a rare opportunity to construct an International Olympic Committee-funded state-of-the-art high performance centre after the latter withdrew funding over the former’s non-compliance.

Just when the new Zimbabwe Government has been preaching the gospel that the country is open for business and urging a change from the old ways of conducting business, a cocktail of corrupt minds and lack of vision have seen this country spurn an offer worth over $500 000.

This comes as Zimbabwe have lost a grand opportunity to set up the High Performance Centre, which had been earmarked for Epworth.

The IOC — through the Olympafrica Foundation — had pledged a $500 000 package for the development of Olympafrica Centre in Epworth, but ZOC failed to deliver within the four-year time-frame they had been given by the world Olympic body.

The Olympafrica Foundation supports projects in Africa, especially for disadvantaged communities, and Zimbabwe had been chosen as one of the beneficiaries but the delay by the local organ has seen the IOC withdrawing funding for this project.

Despite having already received $150 000 for commencement of the project, ZOC could only fence off a portion of the four-hectare land which they had been allocated by the Epworth Local Board.

Problems between the local board and “illegal settlers”, who had occupied most of the area, stalled the project and the IOC had no option but to withdraw the funding as ZOC failed to honour the Memorandum of Understanding which the two parties had entered.

ZOC president Admire Masenda confirmed the sad development yesterday.

“I can confirm that the initial $150 000, the IOC had forwarded to us for the construction of the High Performance Centre in Epworth, has since been withdrawn as we failed to meet the agreed deadline.

“We had been given land to construct the centre by the Epworth Local Board but some corrupt activities resulted in the proliferation of illegal settlers occupying the land.

“Efforts to have them removed stalled and we took a lot of time thinking that the matter would be resolved. Unfortunately, the IOC saw that we were not doing anything and they decided to withdraw the funding,” Masenda   said.

In June 2014, ZOC signed a long-term lease agreement with the Epworth Local Board, which facilitated the sourcing of support to establish a multi-disciplinary sport and cultural centre opposite Domboramwari Secondary School.

The project was the brainchild of one of Epworth’s most illustrious sons, Musekiwa Kumbula, who approached the Epworth Local Board with the idea of setting up the Olympafrica Centre in the sprawling settlement before they got into a partnership with   ZOC.

A ground-breaking ceremony for the centre was held on April 25, 2016, but no work ever took place.

The informal settlers, who invaded this piece of land, were initially told to vacate it and were offered alternative places and they left only to return to the same place.

Sport-loving Epworth residents are now calling upon the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission to come in and investigate members of the Epworth Local Board over their failure to take decisive action against these informal settlers.

Epworth Local Board Mayor Tafireyi Murambidzi was at one stage quoted as saying their efforts were being hampered by some political forces despite assurances that 81 illegal settlers would be moved to pave way for the construction of the Olympafrica  Centre.

During that ground-breaking ceremony, Masenda said the project would be completed in the next five years.

The state-of-the-art multi-sport and socio-educational facility was earmarked to accommodate a number of sporting disciplines including a basic athletic track, a football pitch, multi-purpose court — that’s for handball, basketball, volleyball and tennis as well as a changing-rooms block.

It was also set to have a cultural component, including offices for the director and volunteer staff, a youth foyer, a multi-purpose room to host conferences, concerts and shows, a library and workshops for practical work.

Zimbabwe was first included in the Olympafrica Foundation in 2009 through the Olympic Sports Centre based at Prince Edward School in Harare.

Since then, they have been benefiting from short projects that are run by the Foundation.

The first Olympafrica Centre was built in Senegal in 1992 and this was followed by the creation of the Olympafrica Foundation in 1993.

Such models are in existence in over 35 countries all over Africa and the Epworth project was set to be the first in Zimbabwe.

Sadly, for Zimbabwe’s budding athletes, a great opportunity to train under the kind of facilities enjoyed by their peers in such countries as South Africa has been lost.

The developments in Epworth also underline some of the wrong attitudes in the country where sport is still being treated by some institutions to be a pastime when it has evolved into a billion-dollar industry.

Through projects like the Olympafrica Centre, the youth in Epworth and surrounding areas could also have found a gateway from some social vices such as drug abuse and crime and instead turn them into potential  millionaires.

The centre could also have come in handy to complement the efforts of a number of individuals including Youth, Sport, Arts and Recreation Minister Kirsty Coventry, who have set up academies across the country and have been playing their part to uplift talented athletes who are the country’s future Olympians.

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