Collingwood premiership player Heritier Lumumba has posted more secret recordings of talks with ex-Magpies coach Nathan Buckley even as he says he’s walking away from his long-running battle with the club over racism issues.
Lumumba has been locked in a dispute with his former AFL club for a number of years, particularly ex-Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley.
The 35-year-old has been consistently vocal in his disapproval of management at the Magpies, even following the release of the club’s ‘Do Better’ report last year.
On Wednesday, Lumumba released audio of heated conversations he had with Buckley back in 2014.
Heritier Lumumba has announced that his battle with former club Collingwood is over
In one piece of audio he is speaking with Buckley and former Collingwood recruitment manager Derek Hine about his departure from the club.
Lumumba wrote that the recording is a response to ‘Nathan Buckley’s false claim last week that I had asked to be traded’ from the club and said the audio makes it clear he was pushed out of the club and left with no choice but to be traded or retire.
‘You want to trade me, or like I said, I wouldn’t play for any [other club]. That’s how I feel,’ Lumumba says on the recording, before telling Hine and Buckley that he was ‘under distress’ earlier in their talks.
‘But once again, that’s a subjective feeling,’ Buckley responds. You said that how you felt devalued and whatever … no one can do anything about it, mate.’
Lumumba interjects that he was ‘forced into a position’.
‘It just validates why this decision is the right one for you and for us,’ Buckley replies.
‘You can’t say that i’s the right decision for me. For you, it is,’ Lumumba says.
Lumumba tweeted that his manager heard the recording immediately after the meeting and was ‘infuriated’.
The second recording released by the ex-Magpie shows Buckley saying he ‘flew off the handle’ when he walked out of a team meeting.
Lumumba denies that and asks if he was reacting to ‘nine years of being in an environment that was disgusting’.
Buckley replies ‘it wasn’t in the interests of the club’.
A heated exchange follows in which Lumumba repeatedly asks if Buckley is referring to his reaction to then-club president Eddie McGuire’s infamous comments about Indigenous player Adam Goodes being used to promote a King Kong musical in Melbourne.
Buckley refuses to elaborate and says, ‘You’re making it clear with your actions, H, because you’re not in line with the Collingwood Football Club.’
Lumumba, who retired from the AFL in 2016 after two seasons with Melbourne, now claims he is ‘closing this chapter and releasing the burden’.
‘It brings me a great sense of peace & fulfilment to close this chapter & confidently walk away having taken this issue as far as it has gone,’ he tweeted on Wednesday.
‘Throughout the years, there has only ever been one mission: to tell & defend my truth.
‘The evidence released has only been because individuals have continually undermined the severity of the harm I experienced during my time at CFC, as well as the findings of the ‘Do Better’ report.
‘I always reserve the right to defend myself, especially after working so hard to overcome being…discredited.
‘They will now have to bear the burden of what they tried to deny all these years, and face the reality that they were unable to rectify.
Lumumba has been involved in an ugly feud with Collingwood over mismanagement around racism at the club (pictured: former club president Eddie McGuire)
Earlier this month, Lumumba released audio of a heated talk with ex-coach Nathan Buckley
‘I’d like to take the opportunity to thank all the people who have supported me over the years, particularly Collingwood fans.’
Buckley last week challenged Lumumba via a social media post to ‘put a full and uncut version of our conversations on public record so as to provide context to our conversations’.
Parts of the audio appeared to verify Lumumba’s claim that Buckley accused him of throwing Eddie McGuire ‘under a bus’ when he publicly questioned the then-Collingwood president’s infamous King Kong gaffe.
Now he says the feud is over and he is focusing on the arrival of his newborn child
During one of his regular segments on SEN, Buckley said he was unsure what Lumumba wanted to happen apart from ‘heads rolling’.
‘I am happy to engage with the club however they wish, but Heritier hasn’t been satisfied with that and that’s why we are where we’re at,’ Buckley said last week.
‘There are other versions of the truth that are a long way away from the way he perceives it.’