Homeless? Rome welcomes you

HOMELESS WARRIORS: Zimbabwe in action against Afghanistan. The arrow shows our flag proudly flapping in the Melbourne sun

ONLY a fool, methinks, leaves a casanova in the same room as his wife.

More than that, only someone who is deficient in judgment, having left his wife with the philanderer, would then complain when he finds her pregnant.

Before I sound too philosophical, I have had a burning question all week: whose brilliant idea was it to allow hundreds of HOMELESS football players into Australia for a ‘Homeless World Cup’?

As we now know, 50 of them – including SEVEN Zimbabweans – have sought asylum in Australia.

Forty more are unaccounted for, and authorities are baffled by the turn of events. So they didn’t see it coming?

Allowing hundreds of homeless people into a first world country will only result in what the Australian authorities are now dealing with – asylum applications.

I don’t blame the players. Who would? If I were homeless, and had the choice of either living in some shack in Chinotimba township, Victoria Falls, waking up with no job to go to and with no idea where my next meal will come from, or moving into a facility with taped water, central heating, a ceiling and free food – I would seize the latter opportunity with both hands.

I like the humour of the Melbourne mayor in what is a very difficult time for some civil servants who have to write endless reports about what went wrong.

“We had 56 different nations here, and you have to say this is a very attractive lifestyle and some of these people come from very difficult, war-torn and troubled countries,” says Lord Mayor Robert Doyle.

“While we could never condone people overstaying their visas, it would be quite overwhelming to come from some of these trouble-spots, these war-torn spots in the world, into beautiful Melbourne.”

If you are homeless, and reading this, you must enlist with the Zimbabwe team at once! I am not sure who gathers the squad, who coaches them or where they train, but prepare for a new life in Rome, Italy – hosts of the next Homeless World Cup. Ci vediamo lì!