Whispers flitting from the corridors of Football House is that the ‘trouble-ravaged’ MTC Namibia Premiership (NPL) hierarchy is to unveil Orlando Pirates Football Club executive member Nicky Kasilipile as the league’s new chief executive officer (CEO).
The country’s flagship football league has been under tremendous pressure from its principal financial backer MTC to appoint a competent head of administration as a matter of urgency, in an effort to ensure the smooth running of the troubled organisation.
However, the fundamental question that begs for answers is: how many potential candidates applied for the NPL plum position and who were the short-listed applicants?
For starters, Kasilipile, being a confirmed representative of Orlando Pirates Football Club on the NPL Board of Governors (BoG), is automatically ineligible for consideration as such an act constitutes a grave conflict of interest even if he recuses himself from the selection panel.
In light of these unfolding nauseating shenanigans that have become a daily occurrence in our football structures, the league’s chairman, one Patrick Kauta, seems to have made it his sole beat to suffocate basic laws and rules governing their togetherness at the slightest provocation.
Needless to note that the latter’s ruthless obsession for wielding power, without pausing a minute about the ultimate outcome of subsequent consequences, seems to have exceeded all boundaries of his designated area of authority.
Yours truly does not give a damn whether it was a collective management decision or at the behest of the chairman, but alas, the resolve to appoint Kauta’s law firm to represent the NPL in the marathon dragging ugly dispute between the NPL and its harshly dispelled affiliate, Young African Football Club, is in itself totally unethical and unacceptable, period!!.
It’s transporting a nasty fragrance of nepotism of the highest order, ultimately amounting to blatant discriminatory justice, so to speak.
According to the sanction imposed by the trigger-happy NPL Disciplinary Committee (DC), the offender was fined a hefty fee and subsequently forfeited points accrued from each match the ‘Zimbo’ at the centre of the storm, one Simon Tapiwa Musekiwa, featured. Nowhere is it stated in the judgement that the club should be relegated in addition to the hefty fine in hard cash – Young African’s grounding resulted from points deducted.
Truth be told, common sense suggests that points cheesed off Young African FC should have a binding effect to determine the entire complexion of the final log table, unless my learned colleagues in blue suits at Football House are from Kuvikiland.
Let me reiterate, Kauta has proven to be an asset to the overall well-being of domestic football at club level as can be attested by African Stars’ upsurge.
The legal expert must also be applauded for having steadied the NPL’s serial fragile finances, recording a resounding clean sheet in only his debut season at the helm of the NPL hot seat.
Nonetheless, basic football administration and interpretation of justice are worlds apart – something that requires collective efforts from all stakeholders, including the game’s watchdogs – in this case, the media of which the author is a committed signatory.
It’s pointless resorting to name-calling using lapdogs to justify wrongdoings by implying that sports journos are fabricating stories. “As you are fully aware, newspapers are in dire need of selling their copies, so consumers should not always take them seriously.”
Those were the precise words uttered by the NPL honcho during a breakfast show on Radio Omurari, earlier this week. My humble advice: don’t encourage a fight with the media that you might not be able to sustain in the long run. I rest my case.