GUEST ARTICLE: Understanding Pivoty Simwanza’s Attempt to Physically Counsel People at FAZ
By Kennedy Gondwe
Disclaimer: This is not a justification for Pivoty Simwanza’s behavior but an attempt to understand his actions.
Hate him or love him, there’s at least one thing you can’t take away from Pivoty Simwanza — his love for football.
If there’s one person who, in his life as an administrator, can fill truckloads upon truckloads of donations to football clubs in Zambia, it is certainly Simwanza. Be it jerseys, footballs, cones, or anything to do with football, Pivoty has done it — he is so aggressive in endearing himself to football clubs that he knows where to source football material in China.
For all you know, next time you’re in Guangzhou and you see a fast-talking Zambian with a bald head and a man bag strapped around his shoulders, it may just be Pivoty ordering sports attire for Zambian clubs.
He may not have gone far in school, but when Pivoty smells an opportunity and sees a fountain of good fortune, he goes for it like a man possessed.
When I first met him some 24 years ago at Anchor House (former FAZ offices on Cairo Rd), Pivoty was a member of the FAZ executive committee.
Truth be told, he’s been in national football administration before Andrew Kamanga and others on this executive, so when he’s told that he can’t meet the requisite number of years as an administrator and gets disqualified for that, I somewhat understand his frustrations.
When Kamanga served in the Kabwe Warriors executive more than 15 years ago and the club was implicated for having transferred a minor, Emmanuel Mayuka, to Europe, whose committee did Kamanga appear before at FAZ? Pivoty’s! So while it sounds okay to follow the rules and disqualify Simwanza on the alleged account of having insufficient years served at club level in the last 10 years, it’s a notorious fact that while Mayuka has even retired from football and Kamanga went on to become FAZ president, Pivoty is in no mood to go away.
You see, Pivoty can be cantankerous and sometimes overly ambitious — in 2016, for example, he printed business cards bearing the title ‘FAZ Vice President’ only for him to lose that election, but from that time, he’s not stopped being a friend to needy clubs who love him to the hilt. He gives what they want and is a go-to person for them.
So when he counted his chicks this time only to be told that he doesn’t qualify to stand as FAZ Vice President, the street side of him overcame him, and his immediate thought was to donate not balls, but some punches to whoever was in sight at Football House.
The man had written a strong appeal letter which did not succeed, and he probably thought the best way to make people understand his frustrations was to physically counsel them while dropping a few Bemba unprintables along the way.
I hate violence and hooliganism, and I am not supporting Simwanza for his uncouth behavior, but some people at FAZ perhaps invite such ire on themselves, needlessly.
People have been upset with the drama at FAZ since last week, and moments of madness in the likes of Pivoty may only be a disqualification away from possibly being the second most powerful man on the association’s executive.
Two wrongs don’t make a right, and Pivoty was wrong, but FAZ people must know that many others who are unhappy may take to physical counseling to settle scores.
In most parts of the Copperbelt, where Pivoty spent many years, if people fail to reason, they respectfully invite each other to settle scores through a fistfight — ku i poona fye or kumutula uluma.
Many people on the Copperbelt are generally short-fused and donating punches sometimes comes naturally.
It’s called affray in English, and it’s illegal and punishable, so next time Pivoty, avoid such behavior no matter the provocation.