Goshen runs out of trust

 Goshen Trust, co- sponsor of the National Women’s Football Championship, has said it will not commit its

sponsorship for this year’s edition which is scheduled to roll out on Monday unless they agree on the logistics with FAM and the National Women’s Football Association (NWFA).

The Prophet Shepherd Bushiri’s organisation also says it expects Football Association of Malawi (FAM) to postpone the tournament until their concerns are addressed.

In an interview yesterday, the trust’s deputy chief executive officer (CEO) Willy Kalonga said they are not amused that almost seven months after signing the contract with FAM, they have not held discussions on the tournament.

FAM signed a K50 million three-year sponsorship contract with Goshen Trust on September 29 last year with K29 million going towards the Scorchers and K21 million being channeled towards the tournament. The contract also has an annual review provision.

Kalonga said they cannot release funding for the tournament without being appraised by FAM.

He said: “We made a commitment to sponsor the tournament and part of the deal towards the package amounting to K29 million for the Scorchers was already honoured.

“But from the time the deal was signed up to now, FAM has not

come to us to discuss the logistics. It was only last week that the Women’s FA president [Adellaide Migogo] came to us saying that the tournament was due to kick-off and they were looking for funds to go towards the team’s uniforms.

“But we told her that it does not work like that and we expected FAM, with whom the deal was signed, to come to us and discuss these things and we wonder why it has taken them six or seven months to wake up from deep slumber.”

Kalonga said Migogo was told to go back and liaise with FAM leadership on the matter.

“If anything, maybe we’ll meet today [yesterday] because I spoke to their CEO [Alfred] Gunda yesterday [Thursday]. Otherwise they have not communicated anything,” he said.

“As the situation stands, we are not aware that the tournament is starting on Monday. They haven’t shared anything at all. They cannot just come to say we are kicking off, we need to plan.

“We cannot be ambushed. It’s not an emergency. We are not dealing with an emergency.”

Migogo declined to comment on the issue when contacted for comment yesterday and referred Weekend Nation to the FAM CEO.

But in an interview yesterday, Gunda said they hope to reach an understanding by the end of the week.

He said: “We tried to get in touch with them to start negotiations almost around Easter and they told us that they were preoccupied with Easter activities.

“But we got in touch with them and we are looking at meeting them before the end of the week.”

Reigning national champions Kukoma Ntopwa’s owner Isaac Jomo Osman said they are keeping the fingers crossed that the issues will be “sorted out the soonest”.

He said: “The tournament is already way behind schedule and we hope the concerned parties will reach an agreement soon so that the tournament is not affected