Minister Zizi Kodwa calls for professional women's football and netball leagues

Kodwa was speaking during a breakfast session in Sandton on Thursday morning to celebrate the performances of Banyana Banyana and the Proteas Netball national teams at their respective World Cups recently.

The minister says Banyana’s momentum from their historic showing at the ongoing FIFA Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand cannot be wasted and the professionalisation of women’s football should follow immediately.

"My engagement with SAFA is that there's no time. I don't think, both as football in the country as well as the leadership in government, we must lose this momentum," said Kodwa.

"Therefore, we must do everything we can to make sure this momentum is not lost, and already the person I've engaged quite consistently – because he seems to be present in all my engagements, is the deputy president of SAFA.

"I've raised this, that we have no time. If there's one thing that we must do urgently between ourselves and SAFA, is make sure that we deal with the immediate issue – professionalise and establish a professional national [women's] football league."

The two biggest football clubs in the country Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates, who boast a strong commercial pull, currently have no women’s teams.

There’s a strong feeling that if they were to enter this space, a lot would change commercially for women’s football, and Kodwa says these clubs need to be engaged, as he also looks to push for a professional netball league.

"Secondly, we also need to establish a professional netball league – I think those two issues [including the professional women's football league] can go parallel," he added.

"Already at netball level, you've got a semi-professional league so at least some ground has been covered.

"In football, the issue about commercial partners that you find predominantly in one or two clubs, we need to engage them on their mindset too, [to say] that, you must build this commercial base.

"If you saw in Cape Town, you can actually build a commercial base by also investing in netball. For example, one of my preconditions I discussed informally with SAFA, I said we cannot talk about 2027 in the absence of a professional women's [football] league.

"We must make sure that, as part of our success to hosting 2027 [FIFA Women's World Cup], by then – even by end of next season, we have at least a fully professional national [women's] football league."