Published by the government of Zimbabwe
Ellina Mhlanga
13 November 2009
Harare — LESS than two years after the Zifa Village started functioning, everything seems to be falling apart as the facility has become an eyesore due to lack of maintenance.
A lot needs to be done to refurbish the dilapidated infrastructure with the ceiling in some of the rooms collapsing and cracks on most of the walls.
Zifa chief executive Henrietta Rushwaya said yesterday that when the Village was built, most of the material used in constructing the building was probably sub-standard.
The association then was trying to cut costs but the move seems to have backfired, as the facility now needs a lot of attention.
"When the village was built it was specifically for cutting down expenditure and a lot of money is wasted on hiring accommodation when we have a multi-billion dollar project that could be used for that," said Rushwaya.
Rushwaya said not everyone who was involved in the Zifa Village, played their part in a professional manner.
"It is quite unfortunate that this project took more (time) than what was expected, and we are trying to rebuild the infrastructure," said Rushwaya.
"We are making frantic efforts to get external funding from well-wishers and we are (still) exploring a number of avenues."
The Zifa chief said if the project had been handled well, the national team and the association would have benefitted immensely from a state-of-the-art village that they would be proud of.
"The root of the failure for the national team is the lack of junior development and we can have the juniors training here and use it also for accommodation of national teams and utilise the money, which we pay hotels, for other use," said Rushwaya.
Zifa technical director Nelson Matongorere said there was need for the Zifa Village to undergo a major facelift.
"This place needs to be refurbished to the required standards because at the moment we are not fully utilising the facility," said Matongorere.
"We also need to move on to Goal Project Number Two, which is working on the fields, because right now we have the Under-20 girls team coming in for camp.
"We also need furniture and we appeal to the corporate world to come on board and assist us."
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