Council slashes budgets for sport associations
Malawi’s Sports Council has reportedly released figures of this year’s grants to its affiliate sports associations with the shares of the cake sliced despite the effects of devaluation.
Most bodies told Nation Online they are bracing for tough times. The cuts in the grants reflect the shrink in this financial year’s sports budget allocation to K448.67 million (about $1.8m) from K448.73 million (about $1.6m) last year in the national budget.
The biggest recipient remains FAM which is poised to pocket some K70 million (about $280 000) instead of its K250 million (about $1m) budget proposal, chief executive officer Suzgo Nyirenda confirmed on Monday.
“That is the figure we have been communicated to verbally. We will have to come up with supplementary budgets as I can foresee our programmes suffering,” said Nyirenda whose association has assignments for the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations, 2014 World Cup and the Under-17 Africa Championship.
Asked why FAM does not use the grants to invest instead of consuming it, Nyirenda said: “It is not like we will get the K70 million in one lump sum. It is released for only a particular assignment and this is based on cash flow.”
After the passing of the national budget in June, the council executive secretary George Jana advised the associations to plan to spend within their means and “to appreciate the need to begin to market their disciplines in order to generate own money.”
The Netball Association of Malawi (NAM) president Rosy Chinunda was on Tuesday waiting for the council’s official communication “but we understand it is in the region of K40 million (about $160 000) against our proposal of K139 million (about $556 000). The whole programme will be affected.”
Athletics Association of Malawi (AAM) president Dr. Richard Nyirongo on Tuesday said they had been allocated K4 million (about $16 000) and an additional K1 million (about $4 000) for the Presidential Initiative on Sports competitions.
“There is an improvement as we got K3 million [about $12 000] last year, but there is still a big gap. We will need to readjust our programmes heavily and be a little bit creative in raising funds,” said Nyirongo.
The other hardest hit is the ambitious and relatively organised Hockey Association of Malawi (HAM) which is poised to receive K3.5 million (about $14 000) against a proposed budget in the range of K20 million (about $80 000) and K30 million (about $120 000), according to general secretary Krishna Achuthan.
“They have also given us K1 million for the Presidential Initiative on Sports. There will be a big effect on our development programmes and administration. We may have to change our financial year which runs from January to December to align it with the council’s,” Achuthan said yesterday, adding that the HAM board would meet to map the way forward.
Cycling Association of Malawi general secretary Jimmy Kadewere and Basketball Association of Malawi general secretary Dalitso Tepetheya were, as of Monday, unaware of how much they would pocket this year.
