ZIFA Normalisation Committee (NC) chairman Lincoln Mutasa has revealed that his administration wanted former Warriors coaches Kalisto Pasuwa and Norman Mapeza to work together at the helm of the senior men’s national team.

The Warriors have been without a substantive coach since firebrand Croat Zdravko Logarušić and with the football fraternity anticipating one since the post was advertised amid revelations that FIFA would cater for it financially, the NC made a surprise decision and appointed Manica Diamonds’ Jairos Tapera on an interim basis, to oversee the upcoming World Cup qualifiers and COSAFA Cup.

Speaking for the first time since the appointment, on veteran broadcaster Lovemore Banda’s Lovemore Banda Online, Mutasa said the NC’s initial preference was for Pasuwa and Mapeza to work together, but the proposition hit a brick wall.

“When we started looking for a coach, once FIFA had given us the go-ahead, we actually approached Kalisto (Pasuwa) as well as Norman (Mapeza). Ideally, we wanted Kalisto and Norman to work together,” said Mutasa.

“But Kalisto I think he is quite satisfied where he is, because he was not forthcoming. Then we settled on Norman and for sure, we would have continued with Norman but there were one or two things he was not satisfied with, so he did not want to continue (after the Malawi invitational tournament).

“So we did approach the both of them, that is the bottom line,” added Mutasa.

Asked to shed light on Mapeza’s areas of dissatisfaction, the former Dynamos chairman said: “It’s in the public domain, he worked for ZIFA for many years and is owed a lot of money and that money was not satisfactorily paid to him.

“When we came on board, there was still a chunk (of money) owed to him and we have been making payments efforts to try and repay that outstanding amount. I don’t know whether we have finished or not but clearly these are some of the issues that he wasn’t satisfied about,” added Mutasa.