BNF Youth League position on Constituency Football League

| Thursday October 14, 2010 00:00

 We have watched proceedings surrounding the much talked about Constituency Tournament formerly 'Constituency League'.

We would like to bring to FIFA's attention the following observations not just from a political point but also from footballers' point of view.

* We strongly believe the Botswana Football Association (BFA) is threatened by the government of Botswana to air their views freely on this tournament. A letter threatening to stop the annual grants was written to BFA sometimes in August forcing the BFA to tow the government's line or face losing out on the annual government grants given through the Botswana National Sports Council (BNSC).

*Out of the 16 football regions 14 of them openly expressed their dissatisfaction at the constituency football. It was taking players from mainstream football. It was being given priority by players as there was money involved.Mainstream football suffers from lack of playing grounds that are suddenly a property of the tournaments. The BFA general assembly also spoke of how bad this tournament is and to this day government still doesn't want to back off.

* Football is used to earn political points for mostly the ruling party hence their involvement in running the affairs of this tournament. Members of Parliament and Civil servants are used to run the tournament politically.

*More money has been spent on it than mainstream football which clearly shows hidden agenda. If the government wanted to develop football why not use the BFA to run this tournament?

*People at BFA are all protecting their jobs hence the fear to divulge the government interference. Just recently the Minister of Sport dragged the BFA to a press conference where they were told to admit their designed mistakes and the BFA vice president being an active member of the ruling party towed the line.

*BFA has written a proposal to government on how best they could run the tournament and none of their suggestions were taken into consideration. There is a clear case of people being threatened either at their jobs or otherwise.

Having raised the above issues, we are however of the view that FIFA should avoid as much as possible suspending the country because of the immense progress that the BFA has made in developing football in the country. Lastly we strongly recommend that FIFA takes action by coming to Botswana to carry out their own investigation on this monster that is abusing football for political gain.

Arafat KhanSecretary General, BNF Youth League