Bikita Minerals in limbo

BIKITA MINERALS might have to wait a little bit longer to confirm their Premier Soccer League (PSL) status after ZIFA referred the dispute surrounding their promotion to the top-flight to its Appeals Committee.

The Normalisation Committee have since put on hold the decision to confirm Bikita Minerals as the 2023 Eastern Region Soccer League (ERSL) Division One champions.

The team has been conspicuous by its absence at the ongoing PSL 2024 induction workshop in Bulawayo.

The latest development could potentially delay confirmation of venues and fixtures for the elite league.

The ERSL, acting in terms of their rules and regulations, had concluded that Bikita had won the championship race after the club won its appeal over their final league game against Grayham, from which they were awarded three points.

Those points enabled Bikita to pip Tenax for pole position. However, Tenax lodged a late appeal via ZIFA, which, through its chief executive officer Yvonne Manwa, wrote to the ERSL to attend the Appeals Committee hearing this week.

“The Zimbabwe Football Association is in receipt of your letter dated 21st January 2024 and hereby acknowledges its contents. The letters from Tenax Football Club appear to clearly confirm that they are complaining against the Eastern Region Soccer League,” wrote Manwa.

“It is not in accordance with both substantive and procedural justice that they present their case against a party that they have a grievance with.

“You are therefore advised that the meeting will go as planned and you will cater for your travelling.”

The ERSL questioned why the Normalisation Committee was entertaining an appeal from Tenax when the club were not party to the initial dispute which involved Bikita and Grayham, and which had been dealt with in line the league’s standing rules and FIFA statutes.

ERSL administrator Fungai Munyoro outlined their misgivings in a response to ZIFA’s summons.

“The ERSL writes in response to your letter dated 19 January 2024 where you are inviting the league to appear before the above committee (appeals).

“We are, therefore, disturbed as a league as well as an affiliate of ZIFA to learn that the mother body is inviting us to appear to answer to which charges?

“The league has no case against Tenax and that a case cannot just start to be heard by a higher committee before being heard by the league’s disciplinary committee, such actions being a violation of our statutes,’’ wrote Munyoro.

“May you also shed more light as to which charges are being levelled against us as a league.

“Tenax is an affiliate of ERSL; if they had a case, they should have sought recourse with the league, if ever there was a case.

“May I also refer you to the rules and regulations which state that a protesting club should submit their protest accompanied by a protest fee as prescribed by the standing orders . . .

“Our base of argument is, who is funding our presence there? The league feels that you are setting a dangerous precedence in the history of football by referring a case direct to the Appeals Committee before it is heard by the league’s disciplinary committee, provided there is indeed a case.”

He also said the ERSL was surprised by the about-turn taken by ZIFA, especially after recently writing to Tenax informing them that the decision taken in a case between Grayham vs Bikita Minerals was above board.

In an earlier interview with our sister paper Manica Post, Normalisation Committee member Sikhumbuzo Ndebele also appeared to confirm Bikita Minerals as the Eastern Region champions.

“An official ending to this saga will be announced by the region itself.

“We cannot comment on a judgement by a lower organ which is legally correct. They followed the guidelines that were signed by the affiliates at the start of the season,” said Ndebele.

“Whatever happened in the way Eastern Region handled that case was above board.

“No one can appeal against those guidelines at the end of the season. The good part about that case is that the guidelines were agreed upon at the start of the season. The complainants in this case have to have material evidence, not emotions.

“The Eastern Region was very correct and there is nothing amiss.”