By Tendai Chisiri
Arenel-Nash U17 2015 has been marred with controversy after some schools out of the 12 finalists did not manage to get their appearance fees.
36 teams took part in the tourney after having excelled in their respective districts and 12 finalists gathered in a two day tourney at Prince Edward last year to battle it out for the top post.
Late last year, a school sports team manager at one of the finalist school revealed to The Herald that they had not received their appearance fees. “I received a Whats App message from other school heads inquiring if we had received our appearance fees”, he said on condition of anonymity. He said Chemhanza High School ,Marlborough High School and another school from Bulawayo had received their appearance fees amounting $2 000 US.
In an interview, Arenel- Nash coordinator Mr Mwandibhuya Mutephfa referred the issue to National Association of Secondary Heads (Nash) for comment. “We worked with Nash and you should ask Nash on the issue”, he said. Mr Tendai Taruvinga of Nash when contacted depicted lack of knowledge on the issue. “How can you say that 36 teams should get $2 000 teams as appearance fees, it’s a lot of money. We gave the winners and the runner ups their money and that is all I know about Arenel- Nash U17”, he said.
After being told that the appearance fees were only for the 12 finalists, he retorted that he had receipts to show how he used the money from Arenel. ”If any school head has any queries, they should approach me rather waffling to the media”, he said.
The school sports managers revealed yesterday(Friday), that they had not received the appearance fees in juxtaposition to Arenel- Nash coordinator that they had processed the appearance fees for last year. It is believed that only 4 or 5 teams out of the 12 finalists received their appearance fees.
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