THE Provincial government of Gauteng Province in South Africa has honoured Zambia’s football icon Kalusha Bwalya for his outstanding contribution to football in Zambia and African continent as a whole.
Gauteng Province Premier, David Makhura, awarded Kalusha together with 22 other former African footballers and football administrators at the legends dinner awards held at the Italian club in Bedfordview, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Mr. Makhura said Kalusha was honoured for being the only Southern African footballer to have won the coveted African Footballer of the year in 1988.
He noted that Kalusha was also known for his fighting spirit of helping to put together a brand new Zambian National team following the 1993 Gabon air crash that claimed the lives of the entire national team.
Mr. Makhura added that Kalusha deserved the Premier’s award of Social Cohesion Games as it was during his tenure as President of Football Association of Zambia (FAZ) that he led his team to become African Champions in 2012.
He said Kalusha together with the other 22 football legends from Cameroun and South Africa contributed to national building and the liberation of that South Africa through the medium of sport.
And Zambia’s High Commission to South Africa, His Excellency Emmanuel Mwamba said his country was proud of Kalusha Bwalya and his immense achievements as a soccer player and administrator.
He said Kalusha BWALYA continued to bring pride to Zambia even in his retirement.
And Kalusha Bwalya thanked the Gauteng Province government for the recognition of his contribution to the development of football in Zambia and African continent.
He said it was his privilege to have been with the Zambia national team from when he was young till his retirement and hoped that more Zambians would be supported in their football career.
“I have been privileged to have been with the Zambia National Team from when I was a teenager (1982-2000). Blood, sweat and tears, I hope could represent people who are not here today.
The memories are with me. If you think about it this month (April) marks 25 years since our gallant team left us off the shores of Gabon, it makes it more significant to all of us as Zambians”, he said.
Still great kalu!!
Well done Kalusha Bwalya
Watch the morons below discredit and question his integrity unrelated to the honor that has been rightfully given to him.
I am flying the flag in Scotland – keep doing the same
Thanks
BB2014,2016
Some people!
Some people Agony is: flying a Scottish flag in a country that does not recognise you and you need a visa to stay there and calling the kettle black! What bigger moron would do that!
Kalu is always in with high class, up there.
I see Jacob Mulenga will be the same. He is also married to a white chick.
Class matters
Not abena Kamanga with Simata Simata
Congrats KB
Great Kalu … Congratulations!!!
Really laughable…Great Galu honoured for taking money to RSA!!
Silly amateur reporter. Do your research before putting pen to paper: Ati ” following the 1993 Gabon air crash that claimed the lives of the entire national team”
Kalusha and charlie and johnson were part of this team and they are still alive.
Congratulations
Zambians will remember to honor him after he dies. We should learn to honor our own while they are still alive.
Zambia cannot honor Kalusha Bwalya because as player and coach, he has never won any trophy for Zambia. Not even Cosafa. It makes more sense to honor Chris Katongo for bringing the the 2012 Africa Cup to Zambia.
chipuba ewe
kci…Kalu will remain the great…its not that easy to make it in the Europe my friend.Chris Katong was a good player but not Kalu`s standard.lets be realistic my friend …
On football terms Kalu has a great cv……houners due…
However it seems the one who has taken over at FAZ is also suspect in that he is running his private company in parallel and better then FAZ while being paid by FAZ……his better run private company is used to bail out FAZ and most likely sell services to FAZ …
At least with Kamanga we know the value of the sponsorship deals and the allowances paid out …under Galu everything was a secret, everything had a RSA connection; there is nothing to show for not even a training pitch everything was channeled to RSA no wonder they are honouring him there his U-17 team K-Stars is based there in Gauteng Province as well ..
jay jay I agree with you there. Kamanga is transparent with his financial dealings, while Kalu was in it for himself.
@JJ If you know what the thief is stealing that doesn’t make the offence less. He is a thief period
You say Kalusha is the only footballer from Southern Africa to be crowned African footballer os the year.? I say Christopher Katongo, another footballer from Southern Africa was also crowned African footballer of the year. Maybe you meant to say first footballer from Southern Africa. But again, somebody had to be first
Katongo was only BBC African footballer
Zedians and reading! Just like the author of this article. No research
Same difference in my book
Christopher katongo was BBC african footballer of the year not African footballer, the real staff. Gets your facts right. Kudos great Kalu keep the Zambian flag flying.
Zambians please deveop from this pettiness and learn to harness and preserve our heritage….Kalusa is our heritage just like Mandela is but human!!!
Great Kalu and you will always remain great. You used to lift our spirits and brought excitement to Mother Zambia during your days.
We wish you many more days of success and recognition. May Jehovah God continue to watch over you.
Hmmmmml……this is good but to be honoured by a foreign government??
Yeah, sure. Because you don’t recognize him!
Our Great Super Star and Hero. Great KALU welldone our Ambassador. Lots of you to you for the pride and honours you keep bringing mother Zambia even after your retirement.
His always the best
Why Zambia is behind its because of people like Jay Jay always bad mouthing good things.
do your research about his connections with Gauteng Province and K-stars. The guy lives there, trains young SA talent, took a lot of FAZ business there….why shouldn’t he be honoured…meanwhile back home his bootlickers are forever undermining the current FAZ administration.
Iwe Jay Jay you hate like a witch. It wasn’t only Kalu who was honoured. SA was honouring the continent’s players of the year. And Southern African has only got one. Itys not his fault or SA’s fault
JJ is right, if Kalu was the real patriot most of are claiming him to be, he’d be based in Zambia, developing Zambian talent.
Congratulations Great Kalu we are very proud of you
Kamanga will be honored by ACC. Ask Simataa.
Atase, honouring a kama stinking galu! Uko ka mambala iwe.
You can insult all you want, but you will never erase the mark Kalusha has made.
Witches and wizards of this platform, how good news upsets them is one of the mysteries of life.
Truly a great one, while you are being honoured for bringing glory to the southern African region, those who fought you during your tenure in office, are now at each other’s throats. God has sprinkled confusion in their camp.
The theft and corruption they accused you of, they are now reporting each other to ACC less than two years in office. We were well dressed by Nike during your time, now we are not associated with any major sports wear company. We are printing our own $$$hitt. Embarrassing. You gave us a now well respected coach who we’ll see at the World Cup with Morocco, kamanga gives us wadda when he promised us a world class coach. FAZ today can not pay their bills, they’ve…
Did you ever know the value of that Nike deal or why the abruptly pulled out? Nope…everything was a secret under Great Galu…wake up from docility …these Galus were in the forefront of printing replicas from Chine factory and flooding them on the market and undermining Nike.
…continued, water has been cut off, bailiffs pounced and went away with office equipment, fairview hospital have dragged the association to court for failing to pay a 70 thousand kwacha MRI scanning fee for our under seventeen, yet they shared k1.4m amongst themselves with all mighty ndanga kamanga getting the lions share. For the first time, we have no replica jerseys for fans. Everything is in disorder.
And finally, of course, Mozambique are now beating us here at home we can’t even win a four Nations tournament full of cosafa countries which we are hosting. Anyway as Jay Jay said, at least we are able to see the books that ndanga kamanga is showing us although am pretty sure an independent external auditor will paint a very different picture.
Football today under kamanga is being run better than Kalu???? The depth of ass-holish talk on this platform has just hit a new low.
The only success associated to ndanga, is us hosting and winning the under 20 Africa cup. Facts: Kalu and his team successfully bidded for this tournament and it just fell on ndanga’s laps. Fact : the Kalu technical team put together that under 20 team which previously won the junior cosafa tournament, ndanga just found mwepu, fashion sakala and the others, he didn’t know where these boys came from.
Anyway, we are fair people, we’ll give ndanga time meanwhile his campaign manager simataa simataa, will reveal the type of crook we are dealing with.
I just dont believe this. How can you fellow Zambians demean and disrespect one of Africa’s greatest players on earth even when most countries including Brazil, Argentina, Germany, Italy, the US to just name but a few, respect great Kalu? He deserves the award. So what is with you ba kolwe, ba koswe ne ng’ombe hating fellow Zambians for their achievements you will only continue dreaming about and hoping to achieve?
Great kalu deserves the honours,his contribution to rebuilding the zambia national soccer team after the gabon disaster was remarkable.
Great Kalu .
He deserves it
Congratulations for the honor, you do deserve it but down here we advise that you kindly ask those termed as you followers at FAZ to ton down and let Kamanga do his job, it may be misconstrued that you may have an invisible hand in what is happening down here, enjoy you stay in South Africa as we also try through Kamanga to take the sport forward so that he too can be honored in future.
HERE IN ZAMBIA THE GREAT KALU WILL BE HONORED WITH THREE DAYS OF NATIONAL MOURNING WHEN HE DIES. THAT IS HOW WE DO IT HERE IN ZED.WE ONLY HONOR PEOPLE AFTER THEY DIE
Only late President Mwanawasa honoured kalusha…Zambians do not value hard working sports men and women!!!
Seems most of u Zambians ar immuned with jealous and will jst die with few kwachas in yo pockets that is making u insults pipo on every social media.. Kalu humbleness has caused God to lift him higher every time regardless of his weakness after law his not an Angel. We love u kalu and I believe some day one Zambian President will be moved by the Holy spirit to honour u for putting Zambia on the world map in terms of football as a sport.. Don’t listen to doomsayers
Long live Kalu and I declare u will live until u see yo enemies buried. God bless u
Great Kalu for ever. Your name will never be erased from the Zambian football history. Some jealous *****s feel offended when your name is positively mentioned outside ZED.
Great Kalu, you really deserve even more honours because in your days as a player, I surely saw how the Almighty JEHOVAH GOD rewards his creation with massive talents. You surely made me go crazy happy Kalusha Bwalya.
I can even campaign for your Zambian presidential ambitions. You are highly favoured by the LORD Jesus Christ. I love you Great Kalu. You are my role model icon. Thank You GOD for giving Zambia such a great son of the land. Amen.
Give credit were its due, only the late president, Levy Honored Great Kalu. You don’t appreciate one in death. You like it or not Kalu is the only player in Southern Africa to have been crowned African Footballer of the year. Jealous will take you no where learn to be positive in life as Christians and don’t forget no human being is infallible. Learn to forgive and move on. Make no mistake no one is saying Kalu is a saint.