Zambia: The Football Association of Zambia is back with their weekly President Column to share the weekly updates. They started the column by wishing Happy Independence Week to the beautiful game’s followers.
They also mentioned that Independence is always a pleasant opportunity to reflect on how far the country has come. The beautiful game is not different in its reflections as it played a huge role in signifying the importance occasion in our country. Independence Day and football have always moved side by side, with African nations organizing international matches to seal their newly acquired independence status.
“With Zambia having been one of the leaders in the independence struggle, it was always given that the KK11, as they were fondly known then, would be guests at Independence Day celebrations. Many things may have changed in the last 59 years after Independence, but we remain obliged to espouse the spirit of Independence.”
“In the football community, we will join in the festivities as we have always done in the 59 years of Zambia’s Independence,” said FAZ.
Furthermore, they asserted, “These celebrations happen at different levels, with a litany of independence tournaments held nationwide. Previously, we were lucky to have the Independence Cup that encapsulated the spirit of Uhuru in our nation. Since we are marching to the 60th independence anniversary milestone next year, replicating the Independence Cup tournament would be a great idea.
“The corporate world needs to join forces with us to ensure that we re-energize our independence spirit through sports. As Zambia hits 59 years, we need to renew our commitment to matching up our football achievements to how old Zambia is. It is not enough that after 59 years of Independence, we have only won the Africa Cup of Nations once and been to two finals, in 1974 and 1994.”
“Our men’s national team has never qualified for the FIFA World Cup. We are in a better place now that the 2026 World Cup will be hosted by the United States of America, where our closest chase in 1994 almost led us after losing an entire national team. Our confidence is derived from the fact that we have a generation that seems to have a hunger to achieve something special for the motherland.”
“The senior women’s national team has at least attained FIFA World Cup qualification credentials alongside the u20 boys (1999, 2007 and 2017), while the u17 women did it in 2014. At 59 years, we should be gunning to better these records and match up with our newly attained age.”
“Away from the Independence Day festivities, last week marked a breakthrough in the birthed Zambian Premier League that sealed a K10 million annual sponsorship deal with Betway. It once again reinforced our message to corporates of our game’s many possibilities in terms of sponsorship.”
“Corporates can utilise many more opportunities for transport, hospitality, insurance, telecommunications, banking, and security in our game. We will keep knocking on the doors of various corporates to ensure that our dream of revolutionizing the sponsorship of our game is actualized.”