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Sikhumbuzo Moyo, Senior Sports Reporter

Full sporting activities will be allowed to resume once national associations prove they can protect their athletes through regular Covid-19 testing, Youth, Sport, Arts and Recreation Minister Kirsty Coventry has said.

Responding to a question from legislator Tendai Biti during a question and answer session in Parliament last week, Minister Coventry said athletes have to be in a bubble and spectators will have to wait longer before being allowed to return to sports venues.

Biti had asked Minister Coventry why her ministry was not opening sport “when the rest of Africa and the world” have opened up sport in light of the Covid-19 protocols provided by the Government and the World Health Organisation.

“Sport is a job; it is employment and the regulations allow enterprises to function. In every other country they are having bubbles, the athletes go into a bubble then they have their sports without audiences. We are watching in empty stadiums, why can we not do that in Zimbabwe for the benefit of these sportsmen who are workers protected by the labour laws of the country,” asked Biti.

Minister Coventry said they had resolved as the sports fraternity to follow national laws and guidance from the national leadership following an extension of the lockdown.

“So for sport we will follow all national laws. As of now we are still in Level 4, which does not allow us to have gatherings. The majority of our sports bring people together and we will have people coming together with gatherings which the national law at this point does not allow. As we saw last year, as soon as the levels came down, sport was then allowed to reopen and in January when we saw a spike the rest of the country went into national lockdown and sport stopped. So, as and when it is appropriate and as and when our leadership now feels that it is now safe for us to come down levels, sport will resume,” said Minister Coventry.

“Sport does not fall under essential services as of now in this national law, Level 4 where we are. As soon as we start coming forward – and last year we had already spoken to the football federation to resume through a bubble, that process has been put forward to the SRC and to the Ministry. It was actually approved and then it was supposed to start beginning of this year when we saw a spike and we went back into national lockdown. So, as soon as it is safe for our athletes to continue training, there will be a progression of sport coming back under the terms that the Honourable  Member just mentioned with no spectators, with regular testing, with athletes in bubbles,” she said..

This week a highly placed sources told Chronicle Sport that the Special Covid-19 board had given football the green light to return and they were simply awaiting permission from Minister Coventry