During his playing days, Benjani Mwaruwari kept a lid on his finances, writes sports journalist, Fanuel Viriri.
He skirted every question on how much he was worth. He is never a person to brag about his personal wealth or to show off that he is monied.
He was also protective of his family and the gates to his family were always under lock and key.
I got to meet his spouse for over 20 years, Thembi at a dinner at Wild Geese in 2010. I also got to see their brood at close range.
I also got to see his mum and dad (RIP) at close range at the US$2 000 per table of 10 dinner courtesy of my former employer Gemazo.
I was excited so was my wife Eve who accompanied me and so did my guests at our company table.
We also got to have exclusive photos of Benjani and his family which are safely tucked up at my old employer’s vault. A photo with Benjani, in a special booth was a princely US$20 per card. A pint of beer was US$5.
Benjani looked dapper in a grey suit and black bow tie and his spouse Thembi looked effortlessly chic in a plunging black dress, which teased a glimpse of her ample assets.
Music legend Oliver Mtukudzi serenaded the guests with a top notch performance.
That is how expensive it is having dinner with Benjani. Also in attendance were his famous friends Senegal’s El Hadji Diof, Khaliloy Fadiga, South Africa’s Lucas Radebe, Aaron Mokoena, Ghana’s John Pantsil and Nigeria’s Yakubu Aigebeni and Nwankwo Kanu at the black tie dinner.
But in several interviews during his playing days, Benjani did not open up about his net worth.
The only time we got a glimpse of his earnings was in 2011.
He was ranked highest paid Zimbabwean sportsperson by respected New York sports magazine ESPN pocketing $3 million each year and joined the continent’s A-list earners.
The ESPN Magazine/SportingIntelligence Global Salary Survey in 2011 established that the striker Benjani was the highest paid Zimbabwean sportsperson earning $3 405 584 per year in a country with average per capita income of $384 then.
The survey was based on 181 athletes from Africa, Asia, Australia, North and South America.
The salary survey, featured in an ESPN magazine article titled All About the Money Issue stated that Benjani compares well with other English Premier League stars from Africa, such as Morocco and then Arsenal forward Marouane Chamakh (US$4 247 000) and the Democratic Republic of Congo’s top earner, Christopher Samba (US$3 000 000), who like Benjani then played for Blackburn at the time of the survey.
Ivory Coast’s Yaya Toure, who played for Manchester City then topped the African pay list with an annual salary of $18 200 000 per year.
Real Madrid star Emmanuel Adebayor then topped the pay league in Togo with $11 900 000 and Samuel Eto’o was Cameroon’s highest earner with $8 000 000 per year.
Benjani was however modest on this survey when l contacted him saying then the magazine was probably using the figures based on his salary at previous club Manchester City.
“The figures they are using are probably from my days at Manchester City because I took a pay cut at Blackburn, but I am still hovering around that figure. What about (Olympic swimming champion) Kirsty Coventry?”
Kirsty did not even feature anywhere in the survey.
Benjani then said he owed his success to a healthy lifestyle and hard work on the field of play.
“This is the reason why I had to retire from the Warriors, I am reaching retirement age and I need to prepare for life after football. It’s difficult to have such achievements and juggle with the national team,” Mwaruwari said then .
The salary survey collated figures from 14 sporting disciplines including football, cricket, tennis and golf.
Meanwhile, world soccer powerhouses Barcelona and Real Madrid, Major League Baseball defending champions New York Yankees and the defending National Basketball Association champions Los Angeles Lakers then led the 2011 list of the Top 100 best-paying sports teams in the world.
The teams covered in the survey then had pay out of a combined $15,2 billion in annual salaries, which are calculated from base salaries of current or most recently-completed team seasons but exclude bonuses, endorsements, appearance fees or any other source of extra compensation.
Topping this year’s list were Spanish soccer giants Barcelona and Real Madrid, with average annual salaries of $7,9 million and $7,35 million per player respectively.