spend a month working in the sugar estates of
the Lowveld, as part of an induction programme
to regularise his employment at Tongaat Hulett,
sponsors of the Hippo Valley team he took into
the Premiership.
The 48-year-old former Zimbabwe captain is
considering his options after a stormy meeting
with the management of the club and company
that exploded when one of the managers told
Chunga he would be expected to spend a month
cutting sugar cane in the plantations as part of
the induction formalities.
Chunga told The Herald yesterday he felt
"humiliated" when he was advised that he would
have to work on the sugar estates to be formally
accommodated into the Hippo Valley family as a
full-time employee of the company that sponsors
the football club.
He insisted that he had not quit his post as
coach of Hippo Valley, whom he guided into the
Premiership in his first season in charge of the
club this year to give the Lowveld its second top-
flight team, but was reviewing his relationship
with the team.
"There are some sensitive issues that have
cropped up in the last couple of days that have
complicated things down here and, sadly, what
should have been a time for celebrations for us
has become a time for tension," said Chunga.
"I was called to a meeting with the club
chairman and was told that the issue to be
discussed was my contract, as we move forward,
now that we had achieved what they asked me
to do when they hired me, which was to take the
team into the Premier League.
"The chairman opened the meeting by
congratulating me for the success we had this
season and thanking me, and the boys, for
achieving the goals that the management had
set for us at the beginning of the year.
"Then he introduced the manager from the
human resources department who was
representing the company, who are our
sponsors, and that's when things started to get a
bit complicated. The manager from the human
resources department said I would have to work
in the sugar fields, cutting sugar cane, because
that's how one gets to be inducted into working
for this company, and it was important that I also
do that so that I get an appreciation of where the
money that is sponsoring the team was coming
from.
"He also said that I should appreciate that
football wasn't their core business, there was
nothing really special about the team, and the
company could do without the football club and I
felt that all this was a humiliation and a
deliberate attempt to frustrate me."
No comment could be obtained from the club's
leadership last night. Chunga said he felt
insulted, that someone could tell him that his
reward for taking Hippo Valley into the
Premiership would be a month spent working in
the sugar plantations, and expressed his
disappointment with his club chairman.
"I have a lot of respect for those people who work
in the sugar fields, and what they do for the
company, but that is not what I do for a living, I
am a professional football coach, and in the past
I was a professional football player," said Chunga.
"My life starts and ends in the football field and
those who recruited me from more than 400km
away knew that I could only help them when it
comes to football because that is the language
that I understand.
"For someone to then come and tell me that I
was supposed to work on the sugar fields, and
say that is part and parcel of my job as coach of
the team that I took into the Premiership is a bit
disturbing and I made it clear to my chairman
that it's something that they should not expect
to see me doing.
"I don't know why some people just find a lot of
joy in frustrating others or specialise in making
life difficult for others and, after what we have
done as a team, you would think that we are the
toast of the community but some people have
their own ideas and you feel they are not happy
with our achievement."
Chunga insisted he had not quit Hippo Valley,
but said he was reviewing his position with the
team, with the help of his club chairman, Tarisai
Mudambanuki, whom he hailed as a man who
had football at heart and played a big part in
helping them achieve their dream of winning the
ticket to the Premiership.
"When I left the meeting I made my feelings
known to the chairman and he is the one who
will sort this thing out and, until then, I don't
think I can discuss much about my future at the
club, save to say that I am still the coach of
Hippo Valley," said Chunga.
"I take a lot of heart from the fact that I was
successful, on the first attempt, and I have to
give a lot of credit to the club's management for
the excellent support and the players who rose
to the occasion and our fans who were
supportive. I was hired on a mission to take the
team into the Premier League and I have done
that, we have broken new ground again, and
some people here haven't been in the situation
where we find ourselves in today where we are
set to play against the best teams in the country
once again," he said.
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