The Sunday News
Mehluli Sibanda, Senior Sports Reporter
BULAWAYO City have been handed a $2 500 fine by the Premier Soccer League for knowingly supplying wrong information while the concerned players Dean Sibanda, Lewis Ncube and Bothwell Nyathi are suspended for 12 months.
Amakhosi were charged for contravening Order 31 of the PSL Rules and Regulations which makes it an act of misconduct on the part of a Club where according to 31.1.11 it knowingly furnishes incorrect information of whatsoever nature to the League.
During the January transfer window, Bulawayo City registered Sibanda, Ncube and Nyathi under the development players’ category using falsified documents. The verdict for Bulawayo City was guilty with the PSL Disciplinary Committee stating that clubs must be at the forefront of confronting and eliminating cheating, not to be seen as aiding or abetting through commission or omission. The committee felt that a severe punishment is the most appropriate under the circumstances as such behavior can easily become cancerous.
“The club is ordered to pay a fine of $2 500-00 (Two Thousand five hundred United States Dollars), $500-00(five hundred United States Dollars) of which has been suspended for the remainder of the 2017 season on condition that the club is not convicted of any offense involving dishonesty. The effective fine of US$2000—(Two Thousand United States Dollars ) together with costs of the hearing to be paid by the 31st of December 2016,’’ reads the PSL Disciplinary Committee ruling for the club.
Sibanda, Ncube and Nyathi were also charged for contravening the same rules and regulations as their club. It is stated that on the 9th of March 2016, the three players signed Professional player registration forms for 2016, submitting wrong dates of birth. The forms were then submitted to the PSL by Bulawayo City.
The players all pleaded guilty to the charge and were banned from all football activities for 12 months, three of which were put aside on condition that the three do not within that period commit a similar offence. The players were instructed to each pay a third of the costs of the hearing by 31st December 2016. They can also not participate in any PSL officially sanctioned match even after serving the ban until they pay their share of the costs.
It has been a terrible season for Bulawayo City who had their assistant coach Farai Mujokoro banned for five years by the PSL for attempting to bribe Border Strikers goalkeeper Talent Sande to throw a match when the two teams met in Beitbridge in August. Club chairman Jerry Sibanda and head coach Philani Ncube are provisionally banned from all football activity by the Zimbabwe Football Association in what is believed to be over the match fixing saga.
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