British prime minister says Infantino is not the right man to lead FIFA

British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said Sunday that FIFA President Gianni Infantino was not the right man to lead world soccer’s governing body in the latest fallout from the now abandoned plan to sell stakes in the World Cup to private investors. “I do not believe that he is the right man to lead football […]

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British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said Sunday that FIFA President Gianni Infantino was not the right man to lead world soccer’s governing body in the latest fallout from the now abandoned plan to sell stakes in the World Cup to private investors.

“I do not believe that he is the right man to lead football forward on the world stage,” Burnham said. “The plan that was put forward was offensive to many people, football people, around the world, and it can’t be the case that we just move on and forget that, it wasn’t acceptable.”

On Saturday, European soccer’s governing body UEFA said it had lost confidence in FIFA’s leadership — possibly paving the way for a challenge to Infantino’s presidency. The governing body for North and Central American and Caribbean soccer (CONCACAF) said FIFA leadership had “stopped putting football first.”

Infantino was forced into a backdown over his controversial plans to sell World Cup profits through a commercial subsidiary that would run its top competitions.

Infantino’s plans fell apart after UEFA’s 55-member nations agreed Thursday to boycott the World Cup and all other FIFA competitions. CONCACAF and the Asian Football Confederation also said they opposed the plan.

Despite Infantino’s climbdown, UEFA said it would work with other confederations to “devise a plan to make sure that it cannot occur again.”

“No option should be off the table,” it said.

While Infantino has received pockets of public support from associations including 2022 World Cup host Qatar, Burnham’s words were further evidence of the anger generated by his plans.

The next FIFA presidential election is in March in Rabat, Morocco. The deadline for candidates to enter the presidential contest is Nov. 18, exactly four months ahead of the vote.

Source: AP

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Infantino abandons plans to sell World Cup profits to private equity following massive pushback

GENEVA — FIFA President Gianni Infantino is abandoning his divisive plan to sell World Cup profits to private equity after receiving pushback from all corners of the soccer world. Infantino’s decision came after his senior adviser who sat on a White House panel resigned and Asia’s soccer body joined Europe and North America in opposing […]

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GENEVA — FIFA President Gianni Infantino is abandoning his divisive plan to sell World Cup profits to private equity after receiving pushback from all corners of the soccer world.

Infantino’s decision came after his senior adviser who sat on a White House panel resigned and Asia’s soccer body joined Europe and North America in opposing it.

“Having listened carefully to all the views, it has become clear that the project has created divisions of a nature that, regardless of the level of support, are no longer in the interest of the objective set out in the first place,” Infantino said in a statement early Saturday. “Our purpose has always been — and will always be — to unite and improve. As a result, this proposal will not proceed.”

Infantino had proposed creating a $20 billion company to run the World Cup with private investors including the Kushner family, but drew backlash that grew every day since Tuesday’s announcement.

UEFA’s 55-member nations agreed to boycott the World Cup and all other FIFA competitions over Infantino’s plan on Thursday. North America’s CONCACAF and the Asian Football Confederation also said they opposed the plan.

“Some things are simply too important to sell,” UEFA said in a statement. “The FIFA World Cup belongs to football. It always will. And so long as Europe has a voice, it will never be for sale.”

Infantino’s senior adviser, Carlos Cordeiro, a former Goldman Sachs banker who represented the soccer body on the White House Task Force for the World Cup, resigned on Friday and urged other senior FIFA staff to speak out.

“I cannot stand by while FIFA considers selling a stake in the World Cup,” Cordeiro said in a statement, just hours after FIFA insisted: “Nobody is selling football.”

Hours later, FIFA chief operating officer Kevin Lamour issued a statement to The Associated Press, saying FIFA staff were deceived by Infantino’s lack of openness in planning the sale over recent months and that the project must not continue.

“It is the project of one person,” Lamour, a longtime colleague of Infantino at both FIFA and European soccer body UEFA, wrote. “Not only must this project not go ahead … but the time has now come for football political leaders to ask themselves the right questions and make the right decisions.”

Infantino has proposed spinning off FIFA’s commercial businesses — including World Cups and Club World Cups for men and women — into a $20 billion subsidiary with 20% owned by private investors.

The “anchor investor,” described by FIFA, is a New York-based investment firm created by Joshua Kushner, the younger brother of U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

The next FIFA competition is the Women’s Under-20 World Cup starting Sept. 5 in Poland — which UEFA members said they would boycott.

The misstep could prove costly for Infantino, particularly after the interventions by Lamour and Cordeiro.

Reelected unopposed in 2019 and 2023, Infantino is allowed one more four-year term under FIFA statutes. The deadline for the next presidential contest is Nov. 18, exactly four months ahead of the vote in Rabat, Morocco, where FIFA has its African headquarters.

Infantino’s job seemed secured despite long-term unease with his style and previous attempts to force through unpopular projects, but could become more tenuous with the failed private equity proposal.

Source: AP

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Treasury denies ‘spending spree’ as OPC blows budget by 143 percent 

OPC spent ZiG17.18 billion in the first half of the year – almost 80 percent more than the health ministry Source: Treasury denies ‘spending spree’ as OPC blows budget by 143 percent – Zimbabwe News Now HARARE – Treasury has moved to defend the Office of the President and Cabinet (OPC) after its 2026 Mid-Term […]

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OPC spent ZiG17.18 billion in the first half of the year – almost 80 percent more than the health ministry

Source: Treasury denies ‘spending spree’ as OPC blows budget by 143 percent – Zimbabwe News Now

HARARE – Treasury has moved to defend the Office of the President and Cabinet (OPC) after its 2026 Mid-Term Budget and Economic Review Statement showed the office had spent 143 percent of its full-year allocation by the end of June, insisting the figure does not reflect OPC’s own operational spending or a budget overrun.

Finance minister Mthuli Ncube issued a statement on Friday to clarify that the reported utilisation “does not constitute operational expenditure by the Office of the President and Cabinet, nor does it constitute unauthorised expenditure or a budget overrun by the Office.”

He said the spending reflected government’s practice of centrally managing selected strategic national programmes and projects through the Office of the President and Cabinet, adding that “this arrangement enables the government to coordinate the implementation of cross-cutting programmes, accelerate project execution, strengthen oversight, and achieve greater efficiency in the utilisation of public resources across ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs).”

Ncube said the expenditure covered priorities including refurbishing and upgrading hospitals, national social protection programmes, education and agricultural sector interventions, and digital economy projects.

“Expenditure incurred under these centrally managed programmes is initially recorded under the Vote of the Office of the President and Cabinet and then reallocated to the respective beneficiary ministries, departments, and agencies through the appropriate budgetary and accounting processes,” he said.

Figures from the Mid-Term Budget presented on Thursday show OPC spent ZiG17.18 billion in the first half of the year – almost 80 percent more than the health ministry, which used just 33 percent of its full-year allocation over the same period.

The transport ministry, meanwhile, spent ZiG5.05 billion against an approved budget of ZiG4.66 billion, a utilisation rate of 108 percent, reflecting ongoing infrastructure projects.

The government collected ZiG137.8 billion in revenue in the first six months of the year against total expenditure and net lending of ZiG123.6 billion, leaving a surplus of ZiG14.2 billion – meaning overall, government used less than half of its annual budget in the period.

Ncube said this “demonstrates the government’s continued commitment to prudent fiscal management.”

He urged the public, media and other stakeholders “to interpret the reported budget utilisation under the Vote of the Office of the President and Cabinet within the broader context of the government’s budget execution and public financial management processes,” stressing that the figure “should not be construed as expenditure solely attributable to the operations of the Office of the President and Cabinet.”

Ncube rejected characterisations of the spending as a “spending spree,” saying such references in some media reports were “inaccurate and misleading, if not mischievous, and was never mentioned in the minister of finance’s statement.”

He said government remained “firmly committed to fiscal discipline, transparency and accountability in the management of public resources,” and that all expenditure was subject to Treasury oversight, internal controls, audit and parliamentary scrutiny.

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Mr. Maponga, royalty cannot simply be dished out like GD6s!

Source: Mr. Maponga, royalty cannot simply be dished out like GD6s! The circus continues in the land south of the Zambezi. Self-proclaimed Pan-Africanist Joshua Maponga recently floated a bizarre proposal: Zimbabwe should transition into a monarchical state. If you value my social justice advocacy and writing, please consider a financial contribution to keep it going. […]

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Source: Mr. Maponga, royalty cannot simply be dished out like GD6s!

The circus continues in the land south of the Zambezi.

Self-proclaimed Pan-Africanist Joshua Maponga recently floated a bizarre proposal: Zimbabwe should transition into a monarchical state.

If you value my social justice advocacy and writing, please consider a financial contribution to keep it going. Contact me on WhatsApp: +263 715 667 700 or Email: mbofana.tendairuben73@gmail.com

Even worse, he suggested crowning President Emmerson Mnangagwa as king under the romanticized banner of a reincarnated Munhumutapa.

It was tempting to dismiss the notion as mere sycophantic theater.

Yet, in a country where political praise-singing frequently masquerades as cultural revivalism, such reckless distortions of history cannot be allowed to pass unchallenged.

If Maponga and his co-thinkers genuinely wish to talk about restoring an ancient empire, then they must be forced to reckon with the actual historical, totemic, and genealogical realities of African statecraft.

You do not simply wake up, perform political acrobatics, and award a presidential politician an imperial crown that belonged to sacred ancestral dynasties.

If Zimbabwe were ever to reestablish either the Mutapa Empire or the Great Zimbabwe Kingdom, the rules of entitlement are rigid, well-documented, and strictly hereditary.

The Crown of Mutapa was founded around the 1430s by Nyatsimba Mutota, who migrated northwards from Great Zimbabwe into the Dande and Zambezi basins.

The royal houses (dzimba) that inherited this imperial throne carried specific ancestral totems—historically Nzou Samanyanga or Moyo—and established a sophisticated system of collateral succession (bavapa).

Succession was never an autocratic free-for-all; it rotated among senior sub-houses descended from Mutota, including the Chimbangu and Kandeya chieftaincies of the Mt Darwin and Dande regions, the Chirupata lines, and the Mukombwe royal house that consolidated the empire in the late 17th century.

Crucially, no ruler could claim the title of Mwenemutapa without formal spiritual sanction from the paramount mhondoro (royal spirit mediums) of the land, such as Mutota, Nyamhita Nehanda, and Karuva.

Similarly, if one looks at the throne of Great Zimbabwe, entitlement flows through an entirely different yet equally sacred royal lineage.

As Great Zimbabwe’s political center shifted, its authority was carried forward by the Torwa Kingdom and subsequently consolidated by the Changamire Dynasty of the Rozvi Empire.

The true royal crown of this era belongs exclusively to the Moyo Ndizvo lineage—descendants of Changamire Dombo and Tohwechipi.

Today, the rightful living heirs to this imperial legacy are embodied in recognized traditional chieftaincies such as Chief Jiri of Bikita, alongside the Rozvi lines of Chief Dyumbekuena and Chief Nhema.

The sacred ground itself remains under the historical custodianship of senior Karanga houses like Chief Mugabe and Chief Charumbira.

When measured against these authentic historical lineages, President Emmerson Mnangagwa does not fit into any imperial equation.

His lineage traces back through the Shumba Murambwi totem, rooted in the Chivi and Mberengwa regions.

While his family history carries its own localized traditional heritage, it holds zero genealogical or totemic claim to the royal thrones of either the Mutapa Empire or the Changamire Rozvi state.

Fabricating a mythical “reincarnated Munhumutapa” label to coat modern political authority in ancestral legitimacy is not only historical fraud, but an insult to the traditional institutions Maponga claims to champion.

Political power acquired through republican elections or constitutional office cannot be retroactively converted into bloodline monarchy.

Furthermore, traditional African statecraft understood the dangerous temptation of weaponizing sacred spiritual symbols for temporal power.

The mhondoro spirit mediums were not rubber stamps for political ambition; they were the ultimate custodians of constitutional restraint within traditional society.

By stripping the title of Munhumutapa from its sacred hereditary context and attempting to drape it around a sitting president, proponents of this monarchical pivot commit a double offense: they profane indigenous spirituality while attempting to bypass democratic accountability.

In ancient times, a ruler who attempted to manufacture a royal bloodline out of thin air would have been swiftly cast out by the spirit mediums and the council of elders alike.

In fact, if Maponga and his choir of praise-singers are so eager to comb through ancestral totems to find a legitimate king, they might want to watch what they wish for.

Being of the Nzou Samanyanga totem—the very mutupo of the founding Mutapa kings—I suppose I should start measuring myself for a crown.

By the unyielding rules of actual historical succession—the very rules Maponga so conveniently ignored—my bloodline puts me far ahead in the royal queue than President Emmerson Mnangagwa could ever hope to manufacture.

But unlike Maponga, I prefer to leave ancient empires in the history books where they belong.

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Anti-migrant violence triggers emergency at the South Africa-Zimbabwe border

People fleeing violence and harassment sparked by anti-migrant protests in South Africa need medical care and protection. MSF is providing treatment to people traumatised and displaced at the border towns of Musina and Beitbridge. Source: Anti-migrant violence triggers emergency at the South Africa-Zimbabwe border | MSF People fleeing violence, intimidation and harassment sparked by anti-migrant protests […]

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People fleeing violence and harassment sparked by anti-migrant protests in South Africa need medical care and protection. MSF is providing treatment to people traumatised and displaced at the border towns of Musina and Beitbridge.

Source: Anti-migrant violence triggers emergency at the South Africa-Zimbabwe border | MSF

People fleeing violence, intimidation and harassment sparked by anti-migrant protests in South Africa on 30 June need ongoing medical care, protection and humanitarian support as tens of thousands move through the country on their return journey to neighbouring countries. Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) teams at the South Africa-Zimbabwe border towns of Musina and Beitbridge have been providing treatment to people who are traumatised and those who are displaced who have had their access to lifesaving HIV and other chronic medication disrupted.

Run by the South African government, the remote temporary repatriation centre about 20 minutes’ drive from the small town of Musina is dusty and dotted with large white tents, where, despite it being winter, the mercury hovers around 30 degrees Celsius. Thousands of people gathering there are fearful and desperate; the mood is overwhelmingly desolate. The medical tent where MSF is running a clinic is quite far away from where people queue daily for buses back to their home countries, making it harder to reach some patients.

While working in a Zimbabwean gold mine six years ago, Munyaradzi* was exposed to a toxic chemical and still struggles with debilitating pain. Now travelling to Musina from where he has been living in Dennilton, a rural town straddling the Limpopo-Mpumalanga provincial border in South Africa, he has not had access to his chronic pain medication for seven weeks.

“That chemical affected me 2020 and I started drinking tablets from that year until now… I know they don’t like us here in South Africa, so I get my mind to go back home, but the police catch me before I go … they take me to police station,” says Munyaradzi. “I told them about my situation that I am drinking tablets. [The police] didn’t take me to clinic until now.”

“That is why I have come here because I am trying to get my medicine,” he says.  “My body has got so much pain. The chemical enters in my skin and starts to damage my muscles and bones.”

Douglas Zulu addresses a group of Zimbabwean returnees at the Beitbridge Reception Centre before they continue their journey home. As one of four MSF Community Health Workers at the centre, he delivers daily health education sessions and connects returnees to essential health and support services. MSF is working alongside the Ministry of Health and Child Care to provide medical care and humanitarian assistance to the growing number of Zimbabweans returning from South Africa following anti-migrant protests.
Douglas Zulu, an MSF community health worker, addresses a group of Zimbabwean returnees at the Beitbridge reception centre before they continue their journey home. Zimbabwe, July 2026.
Conrad Gweru/MSF

Across the border in Beitbridge, MSF counsellors are concerned about the trauma their patients are experiencing. Nobuhle*, who has been living in Soweto, Johannesburg, and working as a chef at a local restaurant, was devastated to return home from work on 17 July to find her house had been burnt down. Luckily, her three children were away at the time.

“I found my house burnt. I lost my passport and permit, all my clothes and furniture, my children’s birth records and birth certificates,” says Nobuhle. “I have nothing with me. All I have is this small handbag. I do not even have a change of clothes.”

“I thought having a passport and permit would save me, but no, I was wrong. I wanted to kill myself. I have lost hope, and I do not know what I will do”.

The narrative that the so-called ’self-repatriation’ process is always voluntary is questionable, as many fearful Malawians, Mozambicans, and Zimbabweans insist that they are documented but have little choice other than to flee for their safety.

Passing through Musina, Joseph*, a Malawian from Pietermaritzburg who has been working as a tailor in South Africa since 1995, started ARVs in 2008.

“They come to my house and say, ‘you are a foreigner, hamba (go)’. So, I run away and go to hide with my friends,” says Joseph. “Then I go to Durban. I am staying there at the bus station; it was raining, but we are outside.”

“I leave my [HIV] medication there in the house. I don’t worry about that or the clothes; if I am still alive, I can get it,” he says. “I haven’t taken the medication in a few weeks. It is relief; I got my medication today [from MSF].”

Freedom, a Zimbabwean, moved to South Africa in 2009, where he has been working as an electrician and plumber. Treated in Beitbridge, he was forced to leave South Africa after his health deteriorated because he had been unable to access his antiretroviral (ARV) medication.

Despite having a valid passport and a work permit, Freedom tells us the documents could not protect him when anti-migrant groups went door-to-door threatening non-South Africans in their homes.

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