Charles Yohane
The former BidVest Wits star gives details of his career and what he has been up to since he hung up his boots.
Charles Yohane totalled 20 years at BidVest Wits having joined the club as a player when it was known as Wits University, before later returning to work in the development until the club was sold last year. . KICK OFF’s Lovemore Moyo sat down with the former Zimbabwe international to hear his story.
It was clear from the start that Charles Yohane would play professionally one day. He was born into an environment whose heartbeat was football in the old Harare township of Mbare. Just about every street boasts of someone who played the game at the highest level in Zimbabwe, with Yohane sharing the same road as the legendary Shaw Handriade.
Born as the fourth of seven kids, his older brother Alois also played, so it was normal that ‘Çharlie’ found himself in the ranks of local side Dynamos juniors, moving all the way to the reserve team until he left for Fire Batteries as a teenager.
After winning promotion with the now defunct Batteries – who had Mike Maringa, brothers Gilbert and Kelvin Mushangazhike, Innocent Chikoya, Lewis Kutinyu in their ranks – he moved across the Limpopo in January 1995 as a 21-year-old after playing just a season in Zimbabwe’s topflight.
“I played for Fire Batteries as a teenager and got relegated in 1994. After that our club boss Lovemore Gijima Msindo, who was an astute fellow with links to Gordon Igesund, sent four of us out on trials at African Wanderers,” Yohane recalls.
“The club took only me and Chikoya as they needed left-footed players. Wanderers had just been promoted. Instead of going home after the trials, they insisted that we stay and start playing.
“I think those days there were no permits and you would play if you had a passport. So, from January to November 1995, I couldn’t go back to Zimbabwe and missed home so badly.
“It was only ‘Inno’ who got a chance to go home for a funeral and at that time I thought that maybe he is not coming back,” he recalls with wild laughter.
“So, at the end of that season we were relegated, and I just went back home where I was signed by CAPS United, with Igesund taking Chikoya with him to Manning Rangers. I was at CAPS from January to July 1996 and in that period, I broke into the national team because we were cruising.
“Msindo then invited Mike Makaab for a national team game against Madagascar and he [Makaab] took me to AmaZulu. At CAPS we were winning so I didn’t even want to move because the Zim economy wasn’t that bad at the time, and I remember building two back rooms in one week at my mother’s house just from win bonuses.
“I didn’t want to go to AmaZulu and only went when the ticket was bought for the fourth time,” he discloses.
‘We earned about R900’
At African Wanderers, Yohane stayed in the township next to owner Vusi Mkhize’s supermarket in Hammarsdale.
“If we didn’t get a lift from his younger brother, we travelled by taxi to training in Durban, which was a return trip of about 90km. There was no money at the club as we earned about R900.
“Those days the boss would come with a briefcase and count the money for each of us from the back seat of his Toyota Cressida. This is what I had in mind of South Africa at the time, so you wouldn’t have blamed me for not wanting to come back.”
However, at AmaZulu he found fellow countryman Francis Shonhayi, who had also joined Usuthu in August 1996 at the start of what is now known as the PSL.
The environment provided by the club where they stayed in Musgrave was professional and far different to what he had experienced at Wanderers.
And just like at Wanderers, game time was never an issue at AmaZulu where he did so well that in December 1996, he had an offer from Saudi Arabia.
“I met the agent at the airport on my way home for Christmas. He showed me the offer and the salary was a massive R45,000 per month with a signing on fee that would have gone up to R500,000.
“He told me that this club really wanted a left-back and I had been recommended by [coach] Mike Makaab. I had to either go after two days or on January 2 and I chose the latter because I wanted to first go home since I had already bought televisions and radios for the family.
“Then come January the opportunity had been taken by a Nigerian left-back who came from nowhere, so it was gone. I mean, those days I was earning R6,000 at AmaZulu and could have gone up to R45,000!
“By wanting to go home to see family over Christmas, I missed out on this opportunity. This is what players have to deal with along the way, choosing between family and your career,” he points out.
Becoming a student
For all the good that he did at AmaZulu, featuring in just about every game and playing with injury through half of the season, he found himself unwanted ahead of the 1997/98 campaign. This is what would eventually lead to him leaving for Wits University.
“We struggled at AmaZulu despite all the money and quality players that we had, who included Shaun Bartlett at one time, so Mike Makaab was fired. From mid-season I only trained Thursday and Friday at AmaZulu because I had an ankle injury, but then still even played for the national team as well, which is why AmaZulu supporters even called me ‘international’. I was respected by those fans.
“At that time teams were only allowed to play three foreigners and after Stewart Murisa and Elasto [Kapowezha] were signed, [Lawrence] Ngubane told me that I will now be a sub because Shonhayi will play as the captain.
“Naughty Mokoena was now going to play in my place on the left even though he wasn’t keen on that.
“The late Ben Bamfuchile fought Ngubane about this because I had been the best player at AmaZulu. Ultimately, he said I will have to be loaned or sold because the club couldn’t play two foreign defenders.
“I went to Makaab just as he started the management of players and he spoke to Eddie Lewis. Even though I was going for an assessment, I took my everything with me and after the first day, Eddie was already asking for my clearance.
“AmaZulu delayed it because we were going to play them in the early games of the next season,” says Yohane.
So off he went to Wits – the club where he later earned legend status. His appearances at Wits stretched past 200.
“The days when I joined Wits, they were dominated by white players and when you saw them coming to greet you then you would know you are a good player. They even told the coach to play me,”
“THOSE DAYS THE BOSS WOULD COME WITH A BRIEFCASE AND COUNT THE MONEY FOR EACH OF US FROM THE BACK SEAT OF HIS TOYOTA CRESSIDA.”
he chuckles, while revealing that he only didn’t get along with John Lathan of all his mentors there.
“I never really got it going good with John because after I got an injury that I was playing with he wanted to release me and sign Robson Muchichwa, who he brought in but ended up not signing.
“I had minor surgery and his argument was that I will no longer be as fast as I used to be. Luckily for me he left for Ajax Cape Town and with Roger de Sa now coach, things got better.
“Then with Boebie Solomons, he was my last coach at Wits, but I left when he was bringing all these guys from Cape Town who were all now going to earn more than me as the captain.
“Wits argued that I was now getting old and yet I didn’t leave the team when I had offers from elsewhere when the team was relegated. What was great about Wits is that it was a professional club in such a way that the salary was always guaranteed and when I read about the struggles at other clubs, I realised that it is better to be loyal,” he says.
‘FC AK doubled my gross income’
By the time Yohane left Wits he was well into double figures in his earnings with his life having vastly improved from what it had been when he first arrived at Wanderers.
In 2006, the birth of First Division club FC AK meant he would then be leaving Wits.
“They doubled my gross salary I was being paid at Wits and gave it to me as net plus medical aid and accommodation in my contract. I was going to get a townhouse upon the team’s promotion, so it was worth it to go to the First Division.
“I bought a house in Mindalore, even though upon separation with my ex-wife that house was sold. FC AK trained in Roodepoort so it all suited me because I could even jog to training.
“FC AK felt like we were in Europe in the first seven months before the money troubles started. Following those money troubles, I could have then joined Santos as Roger [De Sa] wanted me there, but I couldn’t relocate.
“I eventually stayed on at FC AK because Aziz Kara was so honest when he spoke that he would even show you contracts for his projects worth millions or even billions. He gave me a better contract, but the trouble was that he wasn’t consistent in paying.
“Sometimes you would get your money on the 10th and at times in so many portions that he didn’t even care how much he gave you. At times you would get R20,000 to pay for the car, bond and the like and then wait for the rest.”
The money troubles FC AK led to the series of crises, court cases and ultimately relegation, with Kara banned for life from football, leaving Yohane with no choice but to ultimately leave in 2009 when he retired and returned to take up a coaching job at Wits.
“The drop in earnings from what I was getting at FC AK was heavy, but Roger explained it to me that this was the beginning of a new career and money would come later. In the end I found it better to earn little than to be always at Aziz’s office waiting six hours for money on some days and feeling like a beggar at times, yet this was your salary. I thought let me accept what Wits was giving and I started helping in the junior team, which had Lebogang Phiri, Asive Langwe and Phumlani Ntshangase.
“My dream was to play until 40 because I wasn’t even a drinker at the time. I only started tasting alcohol when I became a coach and realised it doesn’t kill as long as you control yourself.
“I stayed on at Wits until the club was sold last year and basically coached every development team through my time there,” he says.
In his prime, Yohane was also able to play at two consecutive AFCON finals tournaments, breaking the ice with The Warriors’ maiden appearance in 2004 before returning two years later.
“This has to be the highlight of my international career because I was part of the first group to take Zimbabwe to the biggest tournament on the continent. We broke the spell and now it has become easier to qualify and the target should be reaching the knockout stages now,” he notes.
“I HAD MINOR SURGERY AND HIS ARGUMENT WAS THAT I WILL NO LONGER BE AS FAST AS I USED TO BE.”
Working as a coach
Yohane has gone on to earn a diploma in Sports Management and lives in Johannesburg.
Since his last coaching job in the ABC Motsepe League with Leruma United, he is now involved in an academy based at John Orr Technical School, which he is running along with Chikoya.
The 48-year-old says he is at peace with the life he has been living in retirement.
“It was difficult in the beginning for me because when we played, the money wasn’t as good as it is now but then life goes on.
It is unfortunate that BidVest decided to sell because that was a project which gave us pride, seeing our boys playing, and right now, we have Sanele Tshabalala and George Matlou playing for Swallows having come through from us at Wits.
“People always look down on us in development, yet I feel we deserve to be paid better because this is a tougher job than coaching ready-made players in the PSL, which is much easier than grooming youngsters.
“What they go through and what we go through is different. We need to be patient and clever in order to achieve a lot of things in development,” he concludes.