Royal AM & Maritzburg’s Venue Dispute Hits Another New Bottom

The ongoing dispute over Maritzburg United’s use of Harry Gwala Stadium for the upcoming Motsepe Foundation Championship season is escalating.
Club chairman Farook Kadodia claims to have been ousted by the ANC in Pietermaritzburg and is uncertain about the team’s home ground.
However, Msunduzi mayor Mzimkhulu Thebolla says they are willing to solve the matter for the football purposes in Maritzburg, but Kadodia must also check himself because he was never honest in the past when his club was in the top flight football and Royal AM in the Motsepe Foundation Championship.
Maritzburg was relegated to the Motsepe Foundation Championship in the 2022/23 season. As soon as that happened, Thobela and his municipality team jumped at the opportunity to sponsor Royal AM for three years, which comes with free use of the stadium along R27 million, which nine million rand is paid every year.
“We are talking to them and Royal AM looking at the most possible, simple, and amicable way for them to listen,” said Thebolla to Sportswire.
“When Maritzburg was in the PSL, Royal AM was in the lower division when they were still called Royal Eagles at some stage, they were able to share the Harry Gwala Stadium. But even before Royal AM was promoted (by buying the status of Bloemfontein Celtic in 2021), it is the same Maritzburg United that denied them access to the stadium.
“Now, they (Royal AM) are doing the same (paying back time), but both of them what they fail to look at is the agreement.”
Thebolla says this has nothing to do with Msunduzi municipality but it has to do with both clubs finding an amicable decision.
“They must sort out their relationship,” he said.
“All the time when they fail to deal with their issues they want to blame others, and I’m not taking that anymore, I’m sorry. Because they do that deliberately. Blaming me, they have been doing that forever.
“Their relegation, they blame me as if I was the coach or as if I was once the player. Their failure to get back to the PSL top flight, they blame the mayor that they were playing away. But the reality is, they were playing and it doesn’t matter where they were playing.”
Kadodia told Sportswire that he has been neglected by everyone and he will not play in Durban next season if the solution is not found as they were playing at Sugar Ray Xulu Stadium after a big standoff with Royal AM last season.
“We still got no stadium and maybe we will play in Port Shepstone because for the people in Pietermaritzburg, for 21 years, we brought professional football and once we got relegated, they kicked us out,” Kadodia told Sportswire.
“Playing away from Pietermaritzburg is costing big money, that’s number one. Number two, we don’t have home fans. Right now, what must I do – play somewhere else and find new support?
“I also feel that I didn’t have support from the media regarding our stadium issue and everyone left me alone, I had to walk alone.
“I can’t travel to Sugar Ray Xulu Stadium and play as Maritzburg United, forget about it. The legacy that I built for 21 years is going down the drain now because this bloody ANC government kicked me out badly, this is largely the ANC government, nothing else.”
Kadodia maintains that he didn’t do anything wrong to anyone.
“At the end of the day, when people want favours they come running to you,” he said.
“The same mayor also, he must hold the bible and ask how many times he came to me for favors, for himself. Maybe Royal AM is giving him big favors, I don’t know.”
The MFC league fixtures last season, according to Kadodia, accounted that when Royal AM is playing away, Maritzburg should play at home, but Royal AM became the biggest problem.
“It was all set, but the thing is that Royal AM is putting pressure on the mayor not to allow us to play.”
Sportswire put the call to Royal AM general manager Richards Makhoba for the comment and he said: “I don’t want to waste my energy in this matter because we have a FIFA ban to deal with.”