ZMA to help stop age cheating

Sat, 15 Oct 2016 11:00:55 +0000

THE ZAMBIA Medical Association (ZMA) is in consultation with the Football Association of Zambia (FAZ) for a more formal collaboration to avoid a repeat of age cheating scandal and other medial related complications surrounding the game, president Aaron Mujajati has disclosed.

Mujajati said the FAZ medical team had engaged MAZ to formalize their collaboration following the recent scandal that resulted in the expulsion of the Under-17 National team from a, international tournament in Mauritius.

The ZMA boss said doctors of the FAZ medical team were members of ZMA, but that there has never been a formal collaboration between the two associations and hence calls for more formal relations from the team doctors. “FAZ has doctors affiliated to the Confederation of African Football (CAF) and FIFA, but they are also our members by virtue of being medical doctors, and they have consulted us on mostly administrative issues such as contract terms and so forth.

“But as for the interaction, the doctors have called for a deeper interaction with ZMA to help in their operations as a medical team,” he said. He said it was the first time that FAZ had appealed to the medical association for a more formal relationship especially after the age cheating scandal that questioned the credibility of the team doctors.

Earlier FAZ announced that they were taking a lead to avoid age-cheating at various tournaments to avoid a repeat of what happened at the 2016 COSAFA Under-17 Championships staged in Mauritius. The entire technical bench for the under-17 National Team was dissolved pending investigations into the age cheating scandal that brought embarrassment to the entire nation.