Sports Reporter
12 April 2004
PLAYERS and officials from Malawi's top club Bakili Bullets yesterday visited the burial site of the fallen Zambia national team players and officials who perished in Gabon in 1993 to pay their respects.
The team was led by Football Association of Malawi (FAM) vice-president Steven Musambila and team coach Kinnah Phiri who once played against Godfrey Chitalu and Alex Chola, the former Zambia coaches who perished in the Gabon disaster.
Musambila thanked the Zambian government for their efforts in burying all the 30 members in one place and said that it was the highest respect it shown to the departed heroes.
"On behalf of FAM and the Malawi football fraternity, I would like to thank the Zambia government for its effort to make sure that these people were buried in this place.
"This is the highest respect that the government has offered to these people," he said.
Director of sports Muswayapenga Munkombwe who was with the Malawians at the burial site, just outside Lusaka's Independence stadium said the Zambian government was working out something to honour the fallen soccer heroes.
"As a nation, we are very happy that you have come to see our friends here, our wish as government is to do something for these people.
"We are supposed to be having friendly games in honour of these people, featuring people like Kinnah Phiri who once played with Godfrey Chitalu and Alex Chola," Munkombwe said.
Bullets coach Phiri said that it was a good gesture that the Zambian government had shown to provide a special burial site for the fallen players and officials.
"As a friend to Godfrey Chitalu and Alex Chola, I would like to thank the director (Munkombwe) and the government for the gesture they have shown to burry these people at this site.
"Zambian players should take this death as a challenge to rise and imitate what these people did," he said.
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