The Zambia Amateur Athletics Association (ZAAA) and the Copperbelt Athletics have welcomed the appointment of new Minister of Youth and Sports Elvis Nkandu.
ZAAA President Elias Mpondela said the association is expecting to see an improved relationship between sports federations and the Ministry as opposed to an instructional one experienced during the previous regime.
We need to have a strategy together and a two way relationship unlike what was the case in the past where we only received instructions,
he said.
Mpondela added that he expects Nkandu to invest in all sporting activities countrywide through conducting post-mortems of the previous mistakes so as to create value for quality performance.
We cannot get better results at those very high level games when we have not invested in sports, if we cannot invest in sports then it will not work,
he explained.
The ZAAA President added that the Association hopes to see change in order to achieve some of the goals that have been set by various federations through their respective mother bodies in country.
There is need for intentionality on the parts of the Ministry on what they want to achieve, for various sports federations, our knowledge is renewed every year by the mother bodies, so we know what we want to achieve,
he added.
Meanwhile, Copperbelt Athletics Area Board Secretary Mulenga Chipoma said the Copperbelt Athletics expects the Minister to work on rectifying what went wrong.
Chipoma said Nkandu should ensure that all sports associations and federations are following the laid constitutions as they execute their duties so as to achieve their objectives diligently.
We expect our Ministry to superintend well through ensuring that the sports associations that under his minister are adhering to their constitutions, this was not followed in the previous administration and it lead to some leaders over staying in sports organizations,
he added.