Covid-19 stings hard

The second wave of Covid-19 has left a lot of local footballers in dire need of support as they can hardly sustain their livelihood.

Our random survey shows that footballers are struggling to make ends meet as some of them have been forced to vacate houses due to failure to pay rent.

Most of the footballers have opted to suffer in silence after their main source of revenue, which is game bonuses, has been cut due to the pandemic.

Chitipa United attacker Lewis Mitunda has come in the open to admit that life has never been the same since he joined the club from developmental side Maggie Chombo Academy last season.

Mitunda said he has lost all his property after his former landlord seized it for failure to pay rent for three months.

“When I left for Chitipa I did not know what the future will turn out to be. I had K130,000 which I gave my wife to start a small business to help her and my only child but we could not sustain it. I did not get any single tambala at my new club. We failed to pay rent for over three months and the landlord lost his patience and went on to seize all my belongings like furniture and television screen among others. Life is too hard that I have sent my wife to her parents,” he lamented.

Another player, Hendrix Misinde of Ntopwa FC, said he had changed houses twice after being chased by landlords on similar grounds.

“I have been surviving on K40,000 which Football Association of Malawi has been giving us as a relief package. It is difficult to sustain my family,” he said.

Former Flames and Mighty Wanderers defender Ojukwu Malunga asked stakeholders to find ways to further assist players during difficult times.

“It is a tricky issue as every sector of life has been affected due to Covid-19. Footballers make a living out of game bonuses. In this case Football Association of Malawi (Fam) and Super League of Malawi should find ways to assist the footballers. Maybe they can initiate small loans,” he said.

Recently, Fam indicated that the association would release second chunk of relief packs to Super League teams that will submit consolidated financial report on how they used the first allocation of K5 million per club.

So far the country has registered over 22,304 Covid-19 cases with 7,548 recoveries since April last year when the first case was registered. Currently, football is on a three-week break.