Zimpapers Logo

Sikhumbuzo Moyo, Senior Sports Reporter
NETBALL clubs in the country have reportedly formed an independent professional league that will affiliate to the Zimbabwe Netball Association (Zina) and have secured a $500 000 sponsorship package from a leading indigenous petroleum company.

The new league, set to be run along the same lines as the Premier Soccer League, which weaned from the mother body Zifa, the new Zimbabwe Professional Netball League (ZPNL) also hopes to affiliate to Zina.

The new league was formed because a number of clubs were unhappy with the way the game was being run by Zina, whose leadership were clueless on how to attract sponsorship due to poor leadership.

“Our netball league has been running without a sponsor since 1988 and this is a first that a company has come on board to sponsor netball. Our hope is to have a proper national league that will affiliate to the mother body Zina. We are not a breakaway league, but a professional body just like the Premier Soccer League and we are at the moment working on a draft paper, which we will present to clubs soon,” said a representative of the new league.

The masterminds of the new order are currently going around the country mobilising clubs to join the league.

“We will choose an interim executive to run the league based on the draft constitution, which we hope will be accepted by Zina, but if they don’t, we might have to enlist the services of the SRC, who are the supreme sports body in the country. Our netball                                                                                                       teams have literally been playing for nothing for all these years, but someone has come on board and poured in half a million dollars, which is a huge step in the history of netball in this country,” said the representative.

Netball sources told Chronicle Sport that the sponsorship package has angered and embarrassed the Zina leadership, which has been accused of neglecting players, while also trampling on the tenets of good corporate governance.

@skhumoyo2000