The Football Association of Zambia (FAZ) has taken note of a litany of carefully calculated abusive messages towards Zambia Women National Team skipper and Orlando Pride star Barbra Banda in light of her BBC Women World Footballer of the Year accolade.
FAZ president Andrew Kamanga says FAZ will explore options to ensure that Barbra’s rights as a human being and footballer are protected.
“As FAZ, we have been made aware of offensive messages directed at our Copper Queens skipper after she won the BBC Women Footballer of the Year award. We have sought the help of continental and global football authorities to ensure that punishment is meted out to the perpetrators of race tinged attack on Barbra,” says Kamanga.
“Barbra has not only been abused as a human being but also as a footballer which makes it hard for prospective African footballers to aspire for excellence in the game. Football has no space for racial and rights abuse for anyone
involved in the game.”
The FAZ boss says Barbra’s story serves as an inspiration to many young girls in the third world.
“We cannot congratulate Barbra enough for the many accolades she has won in the women’s game including her recent nomination for the Ballon d’or where she emerged 12th. Barbra is also in the running for the 2024 CAF Women Footballer of the Year, NWSL Most Valuable Player and BBC Women Footballer of the Year,” says Kamanga.
“The impeccable reputation of world organizations and clubs that have honoured Barbra since she announced her presence on the global stage at the 2014 FIFA Women World Cup, two Olympics (Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024)and 2023 FIFA Women World Cup brings into question the motives of those that choose to abuse her each time she scores a global milestone.”
“Barbra has participated at all these CAF and FIFA organized tournaments like all female athletes in the global game.”
Among her accolades Barbra scored four goals for Zambia at the Paris Olympics this summer, including a first-half hat-trick against Australia, to become the leading African goal scorer in Olympic history with 10.
She scored 13 goals for Pride in 2024 National Womens Soccer League (NWSL) regular season, despite only joining in March, and four goals in the playoffs, including the winning goal in the championship final on Saturday as Orlando Pride won their maiden title and was also named Most Valuable Player (MVP) in the NWSL. Barbra became the second-most expensive womens signing in history – behind Zambia team-mate Racheal Kundananji – when she joined Pride from Chinese club Shanghai Shengli $740,000 (£581,000) in March.
For and on behalf of:
FOOTBALL ASSOCIATION OF ZAMBIA
Sydney Mungala
COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER
Great that the nation is in solidarity with her. Keep forging ahead, Barbra!
“…..has taken note of a litany of carefully calculated abusive messages towards Zambia Women National Team skipper and Orlando Pride star Barbra Banda….”
What are these messages? Where are they? Who is issuing these hate messages? You dont give us details of the storyexcept that there’s been “targetted hate messages” Journalism of nowadays is just rabble rousing. Who is training you reporters???
Unleash lawsuits
Just send out 1000 lawsuits, don’t Just leave it to BBC to fight for Barbara.
I dont understand why you should always mind so much about racists,tribalists and such other bigots. Such people will always be around. Remember that you are never the problem or fault. You will notice that such people use abuse of others to compensate for their own shortcomings ranging from poor family upbringing to poverty to low self esteem about their personal achievement and ugly bodies and faces.
Just show them your money!!
She’s so loved by her team mates at Orlando and her fans and her country… that’s what matters.
This Barbara abusive has been brought up by the way FAZ (Andrew Kamanga) mishandled her eligibility for the 2022 Women’s AFCON in which they claimed she failed the required tests but CAF refuted the claim. Everyone is now latching on the same issue.
That’s what’s the point is, you nailed it. Kamanga failed to protect Barbra Banda as he connived with that South African guy. Kamanga is a failed leader, it’s all about getting paid.
We all know he is a failure who now wants to share Barbara Banda’s limelight. What kind of leader fails four times before he qualifies for AFCON? Give me that many chances and I will fluke one in! Even win it! Kabilini chipantepante
Well didn’t I hear that Barbara Banda and one or two other players in the Shepolo-polo squad failed gender eligibility tests?
I think they need to come clean whether she was born male or female, and whether she’s a transgender. In all honesty, removing my ‘biase’ glasses, she does look remarkably like a man. However, this should not be used an excuse to abuse her.
We dont have transgenders in Africa. We dont have the technology to do those things. Mozambican Mariah Muthola looked like a man but she was a woman despite numerous attempts at “transgendering” her by the Western Media.
With South African Caster Semenya it was different because she was bron with both
@Jigga, did you ask your father if your mother was born a woman? To me she walks like a man.
Nostradamus, you are silly mate… you think you are fun but you are not 🙁
This is where the anti-LGBQT+ people shoot themselves in the foot and show their hypocrisy. Barbra Banda is female according to the gender assigned at her birth, but they want Barbra to be male. If she decided to identify as male, the same people would be in line to ridicule him and say that he is going against nature. Gender is more than what a person looks like. The mind also comes into play. Barbra is a female and not male, and so it is, she cannot be both.
If you are a transgender you are actually both. Because after the change, transgender women may retain physical advantages from male puberty. These are stuff such as muscle mass and bone density. But in Zambia we have no hospital that does sex change. so our born women remain women forever.
We are just being too defensive here. Everyone is speculating here as though they know Banda in person.
You don’t have to be white or outside Africa to be born with some ‘confusing’ gender norms. There are various factors and scenarios: born with both male and female body parts; born with female body parts but with male Chromosomes or unusual testosterone levels; born with male body parts but identifying as female; born as female but with features and thoughts of a male (aka Tom boy); etc.
Al these characteristics have nothing to do with whether you are African or Westerner. Barbara simply doesn’t look feminine to me and many other people.
We are just being too Nosey here. Simangulungwa is speculating here as though he knows Banda in person.
we don’t need speculation. can a man bear a child? Can a woman have sperm and impregnant another woman? these scenarios or what I call ‘miraculous feats’ are biologically impossible. Only God’s sleight of hand akin to the immaculate conception can explain that and the bible might lend some help to Simangulungwa.
One can’t be “born with female body parts but with male Chromosomes or unusual testosterone levels” or even the other way round.
Scientists have speculated that fraternal twins may cause a female twin to have male characteristics because they share embryonic liquids. But most fraternal twins go on to possess their biological characteristics. No tomboys or lesbianism abounds among them.
They have destroyed the careers of Semenya, and tried to destroy the career of Mutola who if Iam not mistaken is a mother now. The careers of the two Namibian sprinters is in limbo since one of them won the 200m at the World Championship three years ago. now they are on Barbara Banda. A lot of these insults are also originating from Africans from other countries who are envious of the talent and they band together with westerners to trash these women. Who in Zambia has money to do a sex change?