FDH Bank unveils K360m Malawi netball package
A new chapter has been written in the history of the country’s sports as FDH Bank has unveiled K360 million three-year sponsorship to Netball Association of Malawi (NAM), with K300 million going directly to Malawi Queens, K45 million for a national netball cup and K15 million for NAM administration.
Speaking during the unveiling ceremony at Amaryllis Hotel in Blantyre, the bank’s acting managing director William Mpinganjira said they decided to finance netball because “the Queens, through (NAM)have continuously exhibited massive potential.”
Said Mpinganjira: “We observed that netball,despite being the pride of the nation, has been lacking necessary support,structures and resources.The Queens were among other milestones, the bronze medalist at the Fast 5 International Series in 2016 in Australia and managed to beat the World’s number two team New Zealand,at the 2018 CommonWealth Games in Australia,despite limited resources,” said Mpinganjira.
Mpinganjira said the Queens through NAM have continuosly exhibited massive potential and that it is in this vein that FDH Bank were happy to unveil a three-year sponsorship.
“We are happy to unveil a three-year sponsorship of K360 million to the netball Association of Malawi.K300 million will go directly towards sponsoring the Queens. K45 million will fund a netball Cup while K15 million will be used to run NAM administration,” said Mpinganjira.
He also said FDH Bank is keen on the netball cup for the Queens squad to remain competitive.
Mpinganjira said the allocation to NAM administration is to assist the association become a more vibrant and structured institution as they are looking to recruit Marketing and Finance resource to drive netball growth in Malawi.
“We are honoured to be able to work with NAM in this partnership and l would like to take this opportunity to commend the Malawi government for its continued support towards netball and the Queens and the Nam President Khungekile Matiya and your team for the work you have done resilliently in supporting the Queens,” he said.
NAM president Khungekile Matiya thanked the bank for the kind gesture which she said would help the Queens take the top spot in Africa and break into the top-four ranks in the world.
Currently, the Queens are third in Africa and seventh in the world.
Queens captain Caroline Ngwira also hailed FDH Bank and assured them of positive results.
The Queens have been without an official sponsor since Airtel Malawi decided against renewing its partnership with the netball body after the expiry of the three-year K360 million sponsorship which also included a national tournament.
In December 2016, NAM announced what was supposed to be a record five-year K600 million sponsorship from United Kingdom-based Rach Family Trust.
The deal was officially signed in February 2017, but in essence, it never took off leading to its cancellation for breach of contract.
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