NAM incurred debt to run African Netball Championships

Netball Association of Malawi (NAM) incurred a K20 million debt to host the just-ended five-day African Netball Association (ANA) Championships at the Blantyre Youth Centre (BYC).

This followed the organisation’s failure to get sponsorship from local companies after government fulfilled its pledge to pay half of their required K40 million budget, NAM president Rosy Chinunda said on Thursday.

She said most of the borrowing was done in form of services such as catering at the match venue and internal transportation for all the eight participating teams, namely Malawi, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, Swaziland and Uganda.

“After our plea for help few weeks ago, no company came up to assist us. Government gave us half of the required amount and kwinako tayendera yodinda [for the remaining sum, we have borrowed].

“With God nothing is impossible. This was our event and we had to do everything possible to host the competition,” Chinunda said.

She said the local netball mother body has agreed with its creditors to repay the debt in tranches.

However, the NAM boss said they were relieved that each contesting country footed its own bills for other services such as accommodation at the local hotels. n