ZIFA was last Friday plunged into fresh problems ahead of a
crucial week for the Warriors and the Young Warriors after its official bank
account was placed under a garnish order by the High Court and instructed to
pay over US$500 000 to its former employee Lazarus Mhurushomana.
According to the garnish order, Zifa have until tomorrow to
pay US$518 331,81 owed to the veteran former football administrator, who was
employed by the local football association as director of administration.
“You are hereby instructed to deposit US$518 331,81 into
the plaintiff’s FCA [foreign currency account] from the following account
numbers held in the name of Zifa within 48 hours: 0181197610296101; 1811976/029210; 081197610292103;
081197610292104.
“You are instructed to deposit the money within 48 hours,”
read the garnish order obtained by Standardsport.
Mhurushomana, who was retrenched in 2004, has for the past
15 years been battling unsuccessfully to have his severance package paid by the
football controlling body.
After the two parties failed to agree on a suitable
retrenchment package, Mhurushomana cited unfair labour practice and the matter
was referred for arbitration.
Zifa was ordered to pay the former administrator his salary
and benefits from March 2004 until agreement was reached on the retrenchment
package.
The dispute spilled into the courts and after previous Zifa
administrations failed to honour the debt.
The garnish order on Zifa’s bank accounts comes at a time
the country’s football controlling body has been battling to secure air tickets
for the Warriors and Young Warriors ahead of
their international engagements this week.
The Warriors and the Young Warriors are set to begin camp
tomorrow as they prepare for the Fifa 2022 World Cup preliminary qualifier
against Somalia and the U-23 Afcon qualifier
against South Africa respectively.
The Warriors play Somalia in Djibouti on Thursday while the
Young Warriors face South Africa in Johannesburg on the same day.
Zifa president Felton Kamambo (pictured) yesterday
questioned the timing of the garnish order, which he said was part of a ploy by
detractors to destabilise their operations ahead of a crucial week.
“It seems like it’s a deliberate ploy to handicap Zifa
because we were planning to buy air tickets for the Warriors and the Young
Warriors as well as paying the allowances for the
Mighty Warriors for their Olympic qualifier against
Zambia,” Kamambo said.
The Zifa leadership last week received the backing of Fifa
after the world football governing body turned down a request from the Sports
and Recreation Commission (SRC) to remove the football association’s leadership from office and replace
it with a normalisation committee.
The SRC made a request to Fifa to remove the entire Zifa
board over allegations of abuse of funds. Fifa, however, noted that it was happy with the manner in
which its funds were being handled by Zifa, saying the allegations made by the
SRC against the local football board were not sufficient to warrant Fifa’s intervention.
The world football governing body warned the SRC against
taking any action, which could violate Fifa statutes that prohibit government
interference in the affairs of its member. Standard
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