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| Sports |
| Refs ordeal continues |
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by
Garry Chirwa, 11 October 2004
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08:13:06
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After their agony on arrival at Chileka Airport, Ugandan match officials for Saturday’s joint World Cup and Africa Nations Cup, found themselves in a fresh ordeal on Thursday night when they were kicked out of Hotel Victoria in Blantyre just before midnight.
Fam spokesman McCollins Chibvunde said the association’s secretariat failed to book accommodation for the match officials and he was forced to hunt for their shelter late at night.
“After their ordeal at Chileka Airport where they was no Fam official from the secretariat to welcome them, the match officials jumped into a lift which took them to Mount Soche Hotel in Blantyre where they were supposed to be booked.
“Fortunately they bumped into Mr Henry Moyo (Fam technical committee chair) who was having a chat with Fifa technical development officer Ashford Mamelodi and when the former tried to check with hotel authorities to check if they had been booked at the hotel, he was told that the bookings were from today,” explained Chibvunde on Friday.
He said the panicking Fam technical committee chair then phoned him to find out the accommodation arrangements.
“I then went to pick them up and we went to Ryall’s Hotel where I was told point blank that they could not offer accommodation unless a deposit was paid, so from there we proceeded to Hotel Victoria where we negotiated for their accommodation and they were checked in.
“But upon realising that there was a large contingent of the Tunisian team booked at the same hotel, the match officials were forced out of the rooms just before midnight and we had to go back to Ryall’s Hotel to plead with the authorities to accommodate them just for the night and fortunately this time they were very understanding,” explained Chibvunde.
The officials went back to Mount Soche Hotel where they were booked Friday.
Fam public relations officer Isabel Maziya on Friday blamed the unfortunate situation on communication breakdown.
“Well, we thought they were coming today that is why we booked them at Mount Soche Hotel for Friday. Even when we were confirming their trip with Fifa Travel who are Fifa’s travel agents, they told us that they were coming today,” said Maziya.
But one of the match officials countered: “That is not true there is no way, Fifa can send wrong information, it has never happened, it’s just that these people are very disorganised.” |
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