Chioniso Mashakada
| Chioniso Mashakada | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Chioniso Mashakada Bulawayo |
| Residence | Harare, Zimbabwe |
| Nationality | Zimbabwean |
| Education | Mpopoma High School |
| Alma mater | Nelson Mandela University (South Africa) |
| Occupation | Sports Administrator |
| Years active | 2019 - Current |
| Employer | Dynamos Football Club |
| Predecessor | Yvonne Mangunda |
Chioniso Mashakada is a young Zimbabwean sports administrator who is working as the Media and Communication Officer for Zimbabwe Premier Soccer League giants Dynamos Football Club and also works as the Media Officer for the Zimbabwe National Women's Football Team (Mighty Warriors).
Background and Education
Chioniso Mashakada was born in Bulawayo in a family of six and is the eldest of the six. She did her secondary education at Mpopoma High School before enrolling at the Bulawayo Polytechnic for a Diploma in Marketing Management in 2018. In 2022 she enrolled for the FIFA/CIES International Programme in Sport Management with Nelson Mandela University in South Africa which she completed in September 2023. She started following sport at a tender age where she ended up joining a girls football team at school when she was in form three. She used to listen to football commentary from Patricia Jacobs of Radio Zimbabwe and always wanted to be a sports commentator but her mind was changed after the likes of Yvonne Mangunda and Chichi Sabeta motivated her to be a journalist.
Career
Her journey was not as smooth as people may think as she had to convince her family to accept her passion after she was forced into doing Marketing studies after her family disapproved her desire to study Sports Media. Her break through came in 2019 when she saw an advert for the Yvonne Mangunda Mentorship Program which she decided to apply for to give it a shot. The auditions did not go well for her but she got a second chance after Yvonne had seen her work in sport on her Twitter account and that was the break through she needed. Since she was based in Bulawayo she was seconded to get training from Muziwethu Hadebe, a renowned sports journalist from Bulawayo. From there Steve Vickers offered her a training opportunity at Star FM and was also offered a freelance opportunity at H-Metro.[1]
She joined Dynamos Football Club in 2020 after Yvonne Mangunda asked her to join her there when she was appointed the club's Media Manager. She started as a media intern at the club learning from her long time mentor and then assumed the Media and Communication Officer role in July 2021 after Yvonne left Dynamos for Zimbabwe Cricket. She felt uneasy being left as the only woman at a club that had their myths about working with women in their midst under the pretext that it yielded bad omen after they had parted ways with their former Executive Vice Chairperson Esther Mawere on the same grounds after results didn't go their way.[2]
National Team Appointment
The ZIFA Normalisation Committee announced the technical team for the Mighty Warriors after FIFA lifted the country from international football ban in July 2023. Chioniso was named the first ever Mighty Warriors Media Officer and her duty starts with the HollywoodBets COSAFA Women's Championship to be staged in Gauteng, South Africa from 4-15 October 2023.[3]
