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ONLINE blogs have a lot of fascinating stuff to say about Fifa president Sepp Blatter. The 78-year-old veteran Swiss football administrator who serves as the eighth Fifa boss was first elected into office on June 8 1998, succeeding Joao Havelange. He was re-elected as president in 2002, 2007 and 2011. Media reports say since 1975, Blatter has been working at Fifa, first as technical director (1975–1981), then general secretary (1981–1998), before his election as president in 1998. He was re-elected as head of Fifa in 2002, and was re-elected unopposed for another four years on 31 May 2007, even though only 66 of 207 Fifa members nominated him.

Reports add that Blatter’s 1998 election to the presidency of Fifa over then Uefa president Lennart Johansson occurred amidst much controversy.
“Blatter’s 2002 candidacy has been marked with rumours of financial irregularities and backroom dealings, culminating with direct accusations of bribery, by a third party, made in the British press by Farra Ado, vice-president of the Confederation of African Football and president of the Somali Football Federation, who claimed to have been offered $100,000 to vote for Blatter in 1998.”

Reports add, “Blatter has often been dogged by controversy and allegations of corruption. His tenure has seen controversy over allegations of financial mismanagement and the acceptance of bribes resulting in Qatar’s successful 2022 World Cup bid.”

In addition, he has attracted criticism from the media, senior football figures and players, due to controversial statements. These include the claim that Latin American countries would “applaud” John Terry for having an extramarital affair, and that on-field racism could be corrected with a “handshake”, among others. He also drew criticism at the 2014 Fifa World Cup seeding, when he interrupted a “one minute silence” for former South-African president Nelson Mandela, who died the day before, after eleven seconds. Michael van Praag, the chairman of the Royal Dutch Football Association, called his behaviour “preposterous” and expressed the hope Blatter would not be reelected in 2015.

But those who have been following his reign will argue that if he wants to have another go for the big post, which is as powerful as presidents of some countries because of the value of the beautiful game, Blatter will easily win again, using all tricks in the book like before.

Each time there are elections at Fifa, we hear of strange things said to be taking place, country representatives said to be receiving brown envelopes in their hotel rooms with huge sums of money — $50,000 — and the story line trickles down to elections back home.

We are already in the election season with Zifa having conducted elections from area zones, provinces, regions, women’s soccer and now what is left is for the big one, Zifa president and other board members which are due next week.

There is a lot happening on the ground, friendships have been forged and some broken. In short, battle lines have been drawn. But it does not need a rocket scientist to see that there is more than what meets the eye with the calibre of people vying for the posts. The nomination fees, pegged at $5,000, on their own tell the whole story. That is not small change by any standards and for someone to pay it to contest in Zifa elections, it means they have serious guts or they really love the beautiful game. You cannot just throw that money down the drain, never.

And if we were to ask auditors to go through bank accounts of some of the contestants, the nation will be shocked to learn that some of them have never had that kind of money reflecting in their own accounts and the question then arises; who is paying for them to contest in the elections and for what benefit?

There seems to be some shadowy groupings, working under the cover of darkness to have their own people in charge of football in the country. There are some people who are working behind the scenes to have their stooges, for lack of a better word, elected into important national offices and I think that is very bad.

Football administration is voluntary and the moment you see people coming together to do collections as if it’s a funeral, for someone’s nomination fees, then you should know that is the beginning of a new problematic chapter in the game because once that person is elected, those who did the donkey work will demand their fair share of the pound. In the long run, important football decisions will be made outside the Zifa boardroom. That is pure corruption- cry beloved football!

Perhaps the machinations we are seeing are a result of the high nomination fees, as people scrounge around to get the money together to their “representative” up there, but the whole thing will lead to wrong people being elected, simply because they were pushed by a vocal or more energetic grouping. From what we gather on the ground, true or untrue, there are two main camps, one belonging to sitting president Cuthbert Dube, and one of the challengers, Lesley Gwindi. Other contenders for the hot seat include outgoing board member responsible for marketing Nigel Munyati and former PSL chairman Trevor Carelse-Juul.

Long serving administrator Ndumiso Gumede will not seek re-election, and will be replaced by either Bulawayo businessman and football agent Omega Sibanda, who has sat on a number of Zifa sub-committees and once served as an executive member at Highlanders, or Elkanah Dube, another Bulawayo man who is a principal at Hillside Teachers’ College and has served at various portfolios at Highlanders. Former PSL board member and Chicken Inn secretary, a lawyer by profession Tavengwa Hara, is said to be interested in a board member position, taking the number to three, of people from Bulawayo who want to go to the Zifa board.

“The public will only know of the contestants after vetting on 22 March (today). For now we will not make public the names of the contestants,” said Zifa communication officer, Xolisani Gwesela.

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