Zambia national coach Bruce Mwape is said to have grabbed a player’s chest during the women’s World Cup. An official complaint has now been received by Fifa about the incident, reports the British “Guardian”. Several players are said to have observed how the coach molested a team member two days before Zambia’s historic first win against Costa Rica. The players did not want to report the incident earlier for fear of not being set up for the next game.
Fifa has confirmed receipt of an official complaint and will now investigate the Mwape case. “Fifa takes any allegation of wrongdoing very seriously and has a clear procedure for anyone in football who wishes to report an incident,” a spokesman for world football’s governing body told the Guardian. If guilt is found, Fifa will take the toughest possible sanctions, up to lifelong exclusion from the game.
The incident at the current World Cup in Australia and New Zealand is not the first to lead to investigations against Mwape. Last year, the “Guardian” already reported on investigations into sexual harassment that the Zambian Football Association FAZ (Football Association of Zambia) forwarded to Fifa. Several FAZ employees were investigated, including Mwape and the coach of the U17 national team. The latter gave up his post after the investigation, without further statements from him or the association.
Unwanted touching is not the only allegation against the 63-year-old Zambian women’s coach. A player who wished to remain anonymous accused the coach of forcing players to have sex in the British newspaper. “It’s normal for our coach to sleep with players from the team.” If Mwape wants to sleep with one of his teammates, you have to say “yes,” the player said last month.
Journalists at the World Cup asked Mwape about the allegations, but Fifa officials stopped the questions and asked media representatives to refer only to “football and the tournament”. Before his team’s first game, the coach had already denied all allegations and called them “fake”. At the request of the “Guardian”, Zambia’s football association said on Friday that it had not received any complaints.
Sources: The Guardian, Radio New Zealand
