He has travelled to Gqeberha, South Africa (SA) where he is involved in the logistics for the regional tournament, which started on Wednesday. Koata has been part of the COSAFA since 2019 and has been involved in some of the sport’s high-profile tournaments, including the soccer World Cup. “I have been part of the COSAFA LOC since 2019 and during this period, I have been assigned different roles. Mostly, I deal with volunteer management, hospitality, and protocol. This [time] around in Gqeberha, I'm responsible for Volunteer Management and Guardian Safeguarding,” he said.
Koata said he has picked vital lessons, particularly from his involvement in the World Cup. “Because of my involvement with FIFA, and now COSAFA, I'm competent in the areas of event management, security as well as competitions. My roles in these major tournaments overlap with other functional areas, hence knowledge and expertise derived from these interactions is enormous. Remember, these are top-notch organisations with little or no room for errors, so whenever I am assigned a task, I execute it diligently and professionally,” he said. Koata has been involved in sport volunteerism since the 1980s and has seen his journey take a massive leap with his first involvement in the COSAFA Cup in Angola decades back. “My major breakthrough was when I did the COSAFA tournament in Angola in 2004. Since then, I have volunteered as a general volunteer and later elevated to LOCs such as COSAFA Metropolitan Under-19 2011 where I was in charge of volunteer management and training,” he said.
