Row looms over players' salary cuts
Boitumelo Khutsafalo | Friday April 3, 2020 20:39
The Botswana Football Association (BFA), like all other federations, suspended all football activities last month following the outbreak of the virus.
Some Premiership sides have already stated that they will consider cutting players’ salaries during this period until the situation normalises.
However, their plan has been met with resistance from the players who will accept nothing less than full salaries for at least three months.
The pandemic has not only affected the local league, with reports around the world of some key players from giants such as Juventus and Barcelona accepting pay cuts.
Local clubs have also mentioned that they will struggle to pay players with no income after the suspension of all football activities.
Speaking to Mmegi Sport yesterday, Footballers Union of Botswana (FUB) secretary general, Kgosana Masaseng said the players would not agree to any salary cuts until maybe after three months.
He said they met with the association to discuss what is needed going forward. He said BFA was given a task to look at how the virus will affect football and identify the articles in the constitution, Play Rules and Regulations as well as club licensing.
The union and clubs were asked to go and negotiate how they will deal with the issue of salaries and contracts. “So as far as we know, players ought to be paid and are not in any way going to accept anything less than the agreed amount for at least three months. Players say they can only negotiate after three months. So some clubs have paid in full, especially institutional teams,” Masaseng said yesterday. Clubs such as Security Systems, Orapa United and Jwaneng Galaxy last week indicated that they have managed to pay their players full salaries last month.
However, they also mentioned that they might be forced to sit down with the players in the future if the situation with the pandemic does not change. He said at the moment they are waiting to hear from clubs after sending them a proposal from the players.
BPL board chairperson, Seiphetho Sefhako said they are still in negotiations with both the association and FUB while also awaiting the government direction on the matter.
With the coronavirus showing no signs of slowing down, it is not clear when the football activity will resume.
At the moment chances are that the league may go beyond June, a month in which contracts of many players elapse. Contractual issues are expected to arise if the season goes beyond June.
However, Masaseng said contracts in football are generally tied to the registration periods (colloquially known as “transfer windows”), which are set by the association.
“This makes sense from a sporting perspective, as the opening of the first registration period generally coincides with the first day of the new season.
The general principle foreseen in FIFA statutes is that contracts end at the end of the season in combination with the need to ensure the integrity of football competitions and these must be the primary factors when determining the contractual and registration status of players following the recommencement of the league and other competitions,” Masaseng said.