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Namibia: Officials Accused Of Match Fixing
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The Namibian (Windhoek)
23 July 2008
Posted to the web 23 July 2008
Corry Ihuhua
Officials of the Otjozondjupa Second Division Football League are accused of bribery, match fixing and covering up after the final log standings appeared to have been tampered with before they were submitted to Soccer House, The Namibian Sport established yesterday.
As it stands, Eleven Warriors were declared the winners of the Otjozondjupa Second Division in May already, but complaints by clubs about several issues to be investigated by the executive committee at regional level and at Soccer House were never looked into.
Flying Eagles team manager Lasarus Uwukhaeb decided to blow the cover on his authorities when he claimed that their controversial league chairman, Gerson Ndjoonduezu, and some of his members favoured Eleven Warriors, who ultimately won the league.
He alleged that Ndjoonduezu served as the fourth official in a match between Eleven Warriors and Flying Eagles on April 24 this year at Grootfontein The match was abandoned after a disputed penalty was awarded against Flying Eagles.
Uwukhaeb also claimed that officials of African Lions, who ended second in the league, were approached by officials from Eleven Warriors with financial offers to throw a match.
He said African Lions coach Martin Tsaoseb and the team manager, Paulus Ugelvi, both confessed to him (Uwukhaeb) that they were approached by officials of XI Warriors to throw a match between the two sides, to give the advantage to the Warriors.
They (Eleven Warriors) wanted key players to be declared as injured and not available for the match.
Uwukhaeb, whose team ended fifth in the league, said he did not have a problem with the position of his team, but was worried about "nepotism and betrayal shown by league bosses as they propelled Eleven Warriors to win the league at the expense of African Lions, who were was also in the title hunt".
He claims that the final log standings issued by the Otjozondjupa league authorities, headed by Roger Kambatuku as the league secretary, did not reflect the correct points.
According to the league's final log, second-placed African Lions scored 35 goals and conceded 20, but according to the results of all their matches in the two legs played, they scored 44 goals and conceded 19.
Uwukhaeb argues that these points were fixed and gave the advantage to Eleven Brothers who, according to the league's final log, scored 38 goals and conceded 16.
Letters in the possession of The Namibian Sport addressed to NFA secretary general Barry Rukoro by African Lions chairman N Strauss request Rukoro to follow up on complaints forwarded to him by the club on April 28 this year, after several requests to the regional league had failed.
It emerged that protests handed in by African Lions to Ndjoonduezu at the time never reached the executive committee meetings, according to Uwukhaeb.
The April 28 letter, which was also sent to the Otjozondjupa league authorities, claimed that Flying Eagles were unhappy about a disallowed goal in their favour, an unfair penalty to Warriors, and the failure of the Warriors officials to bribe Flying Eagles officials to sell the match.
When contacted yesterday, Kambatuku denied receiving such correspondence.
Kambatuku said the matter stemming from the match on April 24 was investigated by Samuel Jantze, an additional member, and league treasurer Gerson Uwiteb, who concluded that points be given to Eleven Warriors as Flying Eagles brought the game in disrepute by abandoning it.
Kambatuku also denied that Ndjoonduezu was the fourth official in that match, adding that he never received any complaints or protests on possible match fixing or bribery either.
He said Flying Eagles were penalised accordingly and as far as he knew, the league champions are Eleven Warriors and there is nothing that can be done at this stage.
Kambatuku confirmed that Ndjoonduezu was a former coach of Eleven Warriors but resigned after being elected as the chairman in 2007.
Both Jantze and Uwiteb confirmed that they carried out the investigation into the match and found Flying Eagles guilty of bringing the league into disrepute and therefore awarded points to the opposing team.
They also concurred that they were not aware of match fixing or bribery allegations during their investigation.
But in one of his letters to the authorities, after the investigation was done, Strauss asked to be provided with the minutes of the Disciplinary Committee meeting, the incident report, the complaints of both teams, a referee's report and a match commissioner's report.
He was never given any of these.
NFA co-ordinator Titus Kunamuene, who handles incident reports, said he does not have anything on paper regarding complaints, protests or letters from the region.
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"All I am aware of is that the league was completed and I have a final log standings as communicated to me by the regional league secretary," he said.
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