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Obidiah Tarumbwa

Sikhumbuzo Moyo, Senior Sports Reporter
CHICKEN Inn star striker Obadiah Tarumbwa will tomorrow give a motivational speech to disadvantaged children from Reigate district in Bulawayo during the Sports and Recreation Commission’s 100 day rapid results initiative.

The event, meant to bring together young ones from the district will be held at Thomas Rudland Primary School and the children will exhibit their skills under various sport codes that include athletics, football and netball as well as traditional games.

“We picked on Tarumbwa because we all know his background and we believe that his speech will help motivate these other kids who are underprivileged and help inspire them into believing that all is not lost by the situation they find themselves in,” said the Bulawayo Metropolitan province’s co-ordinator in the Ministry of Youth, Sport, Arts and Recreation Sam Dzvimbu.

Despite coming from a disadvantaged background, Tarumbwa’s life story will surely be an inspiration to the children.

The Chicken Inn star started his career at Highlanders where he managed to break into the first team at an early age and his talent saw him attracting the attention of Cercle Brugge in Belgium. He played in Belgium before leaving for Cyprus to turn out for Ermis Aradippou. In 2009, he returned to mother continent and was taken on board by Kenyan champions, Sofapaka. He was to leave the Kenyan side for South Africa’s University of Pretoria in 2013.

Despite the struggles of football, Tarumbwa never gave up his boots, returning home to play for Bantu Rovers who then loaned him back to his childhood team Highlanders for the 2015-2016 season.

“Besides Tarumbwa we have also invited Raj Modi, the chairperson of the Bulawayo Sports Development Committee who will actually be our guest of honour. I need to hasten to say that from Reigate district we will then move to Nketa Hall in Ward 24 under Mzilikazi district on April 21. The 100 day rapid results initiative targets about 20 districts nationally and as Bulawayo we settled for these two,” said Dzvimbu.