Andrew Watson: The 'most influential' black footballer for decades lost to history

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  By Andrew Aloia BBC Sport Last updated on 11 October 2021 11 October 2021 . From the section Football Watson was a trailblazer who helped transform how football was played There are two murals of black footballers facing one another across an alleyway in Glasgow. One helped shape football as we know it, the other is Pele. Andrew Watson captained Scotland to a 6-1 win over England on his debut in 1881. He was a pioneer, the world's first black international, but for more than a century the significance of his achievements went unrecognised. Research conducted over the past three decades has left us with some biographical details: a man descended of slaves and of those who enslaved them, born in Guyana, raised to become an English gentleman and famed as one of Scottish football's first icons. And yet today, 100 years on from his death aged 64, Watson remains something of an enigma, the picture built around him a fractured one. His grainy, faded, sepia image evokes many differen
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Markets Zimbabwe Tycoon Used State Ties to Hide Assets, Report Says

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 Updated on 
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    Tagwirei sought to shield holdings from more sanctions
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    Businessman has had preferential access to scarce dollars
Kudakwashe Tagwirei
Kudakwashe Tagwirei Photographer: Jekesai Njikizana/AFP via Getty Images

Zimbabwean tycoon Kudakwashe Tagwirei used connections with government leaders and central bank officials to gain access to hard currency and shield assets from the U.S. Treasury, according to a report by a private anti-corruption group.

Tagwirei, who was sanctioned by the U.S. in 2020 for corruption, “appears to have the ability to contact senior civilian officials in Zimbabwe at short notice, particularly at the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe,” said the report by The Sentry, the Washington, D.C.-based organization co-founded by the actor and director George Clooney.

Such access “raises the possibility of state capture, when the public realm -- particularly regulatory, legal, and public policy decision-making -- has been influenced to benefit private interests,” it said. With its sanctions, the U.S. said Tagwirei had “favored access to hard currency” and linked him to the disappearance of $3 billion from a farm-subsidy program.

The Sentry report said the businessmen was at the center of a web of transactions that led to the establishment of Kuvimba Mining House Ltd., a public-private operation that claims some of Zimbabwe’s most valuable gold, platinum, chrome and nickel mines. The assets were moved from Sotic International Ltd., a Mauritius-based holding company that has been part owned by Tagwirei.

Bloomberg in May reported that Kuvimba’s core mining assets were until recently owned by or tied to Tagwirei. The Zimbabwean government won’t say where it got the funds to cover its purchase of the mines, smelters and platinum concessions the Kuvimba venture says it now owns.

Read more: The deals that connect Tagwirei to Zimbabwe mining assets

Clive Mphambela, spokesman for ministry of finance said he wouldn’t immediately comment when contacted by Bloomberg but could later. Calls to Tagwirei didn’t connect and he didn’t immediately reply to text messages.

The governor of the central bank John Mangudya said its a misconception that the bank handles commercial transactions.

“We are not aware of preferential treatment in the allocation of foreign currency given to him,” Mangudya said in a text message. “The reserve bank is a banker to the state and banker to commercial banks and therefore does not process commercial transactions for individuals and private entities other than for government and banks.”

(Updates with central bank Governor’s comments from seventh paragraph)

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