By Anyway Yotamu.
As we celebrate the women’s month Spiked Online Media reporter Anyway Yotamu caught up with Ellen Chiwenga who is the only Zimbabwean accredited female FIFA Football Match Agent and below is her biography:
Ellen Chiwenga is a FIFA Football Match Agent, as well as a member of the Association of Football Agents (AFA), the International Association of FIFA Licensed Football Match Agents (FIFMA), and Women in Football (WIF) from Zimbabwe. She has been working in the world of football for more than 15 years.
During all those years, she has learned step by step all the aspects of the game, from grassroots and scouting to tactics, global business development and transfers. Through her drive to make a change in a male-dominated industry and ambition to promote diversity and equality in the game, she is today the only woman Football Match Agent in England and the only African woman Football Match Agent in the world.
As part of her duties, Ellen legally represents athletes by checking their contracts and negotiating their employment. She is responsible for the communication between the managers and individuals she represents to ensure that both sides are satisfied. She also arranges worldwide matches between teams belonging to different Confederations, such as friendly matches and tournaments between national teams or clubs.
With passion and relentless determination, Ellen works tirelessly to promote social and economic development through football. She transforms football into a powerful instrument of economic and human development that builds healthy communities, fosters growth, empowers women, and inspires change around the world.
As such, she brings in global investors in order to acquire the necessary financial backing to help develop country infrastructures through charity work and worldwide sponsorships. Her work across the globe brings not only hope and jobs to local populations but also bright new opportunities to minorities, disadvantaged children and the youth.
Ellen is an extraordinary role model with incredible passion who dedicates her life to make a lasting, positive impact in the lives of millions through the universal language of football.
She was awarded the Personality of the Year Award under the 2017 Zimbabwe Achievers Awards and the African Woman of the Year in Football in 2018. That same year, she became an Ambassador of FC Karachi in Pakistan.
In August 2019, Ellen Chiwenga was appointed Global Goodwill Ambassador of Bring Hope Humanitarian Foundation (BHHF), a charity organisation that delivers humanitarian aid and medicines to internal displaced people, refugees, and people in need around the world.
In November 2019, Ellen was awarded the prestigious Football Black List Award for her outstanding work in football. She is a member of the ‘Right to Play’ Partnerships Committee and in January 2020 was awarded the Medal of Knight of the Order of Lafayette.
February 2020 she announced her ambitions to contest for the next ZIFA president position (Zimbabwe Football Association) which is expected to be held in 2023, she will become the first female candidate to contest for this position in the history of Zimbabwean football.
The football guru is not related to the country’s second in command, Vice President Constantino Chiwenga.