Malawi National Council of Sports says Netball Association of Malawi (NAM) requested for funding for participation in a Tri-Nation Series tournament in South Africa against the hosts and England and not training games.
Sports Council board chairperson Sunduzwayo Madise said in an interview yesterday that NAM did not mention that the games were non-ranking training matches to be played in camera.
He was reacting to NAM’s decision to withhold results from the games on the basis that they are just training matches.
The Queens lost to South Africa’s Spar Proteas on the first day of the games on Monday and NAM issued a blackout on the second day after the team suffered a massacre against England’s Vitality Roses on Tuesday.
The Peace Chawinga-led technical panel insisted that the results from the games would not be made public because they are just training matches.
But Madise yesterday ordered NAM to release all the team’s results because they communicated to government and got taxpayers’ money on the pretence that they were going to participate in a tournament.
He said: “NAM must immediately release results of the Malawi Queens in South Africa. Sports Council was told that the Queens were going for a Tri-Nation tournament. Unless Sports Council was lied to, and that wouldn’t be nice. Their travel is sponsored by tax payers.”
NAM general secretary Isaac Chimwala yesterday insisted that the games were training matches.
He said: “From the moment we started discussing with our counterparts in South Africa and England, we agreed that these games would be training matches. At no point did we discuss that these games would be competitive. I was involved in all discussions.”
On why they communicated to Sports Council that the games were a Tri-Nation tournament, Chimwala said he was not present when NAM wrote the letter to government for funding.
He said: “I don’t know the contents of the letter to Sports Council. The [NAM] vice-president [Chimwemwe Bakali], is better placed to explain what they told Sports Council in that letter.”
Bakali was not available for comment yesterday.
But a press statement released by NAM on June 21 stated that the Queens were going to participate in a Tri-Nation Test Series and not training matches.
The statement read: “The Malawi Senior Netball Team will be leaving the country on 23 June 2022 for Cape Town, South Africa to participate in the Tri Nation Netball Testing games involving Malawi South Africa and England.”
The Queens will play their last game against South Africa on Saturday.
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