Just what the doctor ordered
THE suspension of the ZIFA board has clearly divided opinion within Zimbabwe’s football community and beyond.
While views and opinions may differ, what really matters is having a healthy debate for the good of the game.
Interpretation of legal statutes is no small feat by any measure, which explains why it likely generates both informed and uninformed arguments. However, while debating, what is important is not to lose focus of the main issues.
The current situation between the Sports and Recreation Commission (SRC) and ZIFA (Zimbabwe Football Association) falls into the same category.
What is clear is that our football is dysfunctional at all levels and something needs to be urgently done if we truly love the sport as we all claim. One is, therefore, tempted to subscribe to the philosophy that the end justifies the means.
Unfortunately, at times this approach has its fair share of collateral damage.
The suspension of the ZIFA board is a necessary evil given the decayed state our football.
It is even struggling to attract meaningful commercial interest from corporates, donors and individuals.
Traditional structures that used to be relied on to supply young athletes are drying up.
Exporting talent is becoming a fading dream. Government’s is fast becoming fatigued of supporting sport due to poor returns on investment.
Also nauseating is the tendency to recycle old players, including rampant and unexplained cancellations of participation of national teams in some CAF, COSAFA and FIFA tournaments.
Resource allocation is also questionable. Negative headlines have become the order of the day, and one can only imagine what it does to the attractiveness of the game.
We can no longer pretend that everything is okay. Some of the malfeasance affecting out football includes poor corporate governance, directionless, disorganisation, financial delinquency and endless controversies.
These charges are rightly directed at the ZIFA board as custodians of football in the country.
It might be a bad omen to celebrate prematurely, but one can be forgiven for being optimistic that good times in football are beckoning.
The SRC roadmap that is under the stewardship of a nine-member committee has all the ingredients to stop the free-fall of our football.
There is every reason to celebrate, especially if one looks at the calibre and composition of the committee and its terms of reference.
As they carry out their mandate in the next 12 months, we need to be cognisant of the fact that effective leadership is also dependent on the quality of those being led.
Those who love football are therefore duty-bound to play their part and support the committee.
No one is under the illusion that this is going to be an easy assignment.
The best we can do as followers is to provide any information required, critique the process where necessary, promote work of the committee and do anything and everything that will make the assignment a success.
The rest is for the committee to create the right environment, systems and infrastructure to enable members of the football community to input into their work.
It is, therefore, imperative to talk up the work of the committee as a way of helping stakeholders to become aware of its existence, its mandate and objectives.
This exercise will serve other sporting codes beyond football, given the fact that there are other troubled national sports associations (NSA) that have not yet imploded, as has happened at ZIFA. One can only assume that the SRC, through the nine-member committee, will endeavour to create a strong and solid basis for cultivating progressive relationships among various football stakeholders in determining the direction and performance of all the game’s structures.
It is imperative to highlight that corporate governance is one of the important constructs of strategic implementation.
Other pillars include effective organisational design, strategic leadership, innovation and culture.
These are just but a component of the entire strategic management process, which demands that there be formulation of strategy and its evaluation or performance management. The terms of reference handed out to the reform committee has all the traits of a strategic management process, which earns the SRC roadmap all the marks for a well-meaning and strategic framework for setting up a sport venture poised and destined for success.
The long and short of it is that our football needs a concise, clear, coherent and comprehensive strategic plan.
This entails a thorough situational audit that will reveal the sport’s strengths and opportunities whilst exposing the weaknesses in our football and threats confronting it.
This strategic control puts the game on good stead to use its strength as a competitive advantage to exploit abundant opportunities in the multibillion-dollar industry.
The same process is key to remedying weaknesses through further learning integrative, collaborative and cooperative strategies that will enable our football to adapt to and anticipate threats in the external environment and ward them off.
Having identified corporate governance as a key component of successfully executing our football strategy, one has to note that it was born out of the need to bridge ownership with control in a joint stock ownership set-up. ◆