The Football Association of Zambia (FAZ) is in a deep debt about 1.5 billion kwacha (about 440,000 U.S. dollars) including a bank overdraft of 180 million (about 53,000 dollars), according to Times of Zambia.
It quoted Sport, Youth and Child Development Minister Gabriel Namulambe as saying here Sunday that the government would thoroughly investigate the matter and that auditors would soon move in.
Namulambe said in an interview that the huge debts were incurred by the previous executive and has sympathized with the Kalusha Bwalya-led executive committee.
The minister has since appealed to all creditors to give the association time to settle down.
He, however, cautioned the current FAZ executive committee against incurring unnecessary bank overdrafts which they could not service.
He said: “We sympathize with FAZ, they took over 1.5 billion kwacha debts and out of that 180 million kwacha is a bank overdraft. One would wonder how such a huge debt can be incurred.
“We are calling upon all FAZ creditors to be patient and give them time to settle down,” he said.
Namulambe said he would soon send auditors to carry out an investigative audit exercise so as to ascertain how the association found itself in such a financial crisis.
“We are sending auditors to do an investigative audit, to go deeper into how these debts were incurred. I want to caution the new executive not to fall prey to incurring unnecessary overdrafts without servicing them,” he said.
Last month, FAZ engaged auditors to investigate the association’s accounts where over 2 billion kwacha was spent within a space of three months.