Soccer honchos mull over Fifa stance as Ghana mocks Safa

WHILE South Africa’s football fraternity is still reeling with shock after Fifa rejected South Africa’s protest with an abrupt one-liner, Ghana FA scornfully said the outcome has shown “South African Football Association knows nothing in football”.

On Friday afternoon, world football governing body Fifa, ended its 10-day silent treatment by declaring that the protest lodged by the South African Football Association (Safa) was “inadmissible”.

The Fifa Disciplinary Committee had already met on November 23 to consider the protest which followed Bafana Bafana’s controversial 1-0 loss to the Black Stars of Ghana on November 14.

The protest was lodged with Fifa on November 15. Fifa publicly acknowledged receiving the protest and said its disciplinary committee would meet on November 23.

Safa CEO Tebogo Motlanthe was somewhat perplexed by Fifa’s blunt response which it did not explain.

“They [Fifa] responded only with a one-liner to say our appeal was inadmissible,” said Motlanthe.

“We are still going to discuss the way forward and formulate a response. For now, that is all Fifa have said in their response today. We will need further explanation before we can respond in detail.”

While several media reports say South Africa have 10 days to appeal, the official document that Safa made available to domestic media says Safa may request an explanation for the rejection of the protest.

Fifa’s statement reads: “The judicial bodies may decide not to communicate the grounds of a decision and instead communicate only the terms of the decision. The parties have 10 days from receipt of the terms of the decision to request, in writing, the grounds of the decision and that failure to do so will result in the decision becoming final and binding (article 51 of the Fifa Disciplinary Code).”

Fifa’s announcement was met with jubilation in Ghana. The country’s media carried reports that acclaimed the outcome of South Africa’s protest. Leading the charge was Ghana Football Association general secretary Prosper Harrison Addo. He was loud and proud as he poured scorn on Safa in an interview on Light FM, a commercial-free online radio station.

He said South Africa failed to accept the decision in good faith.

“The South African Football Association knows nothing in football and this case clearly shows how incompetent they are,” said Addo. “They want to frustrate Ghana, and we are focussed on the Afcon and the Fifa World Cup play-off.”

A Ghana-based report said that South Africa would head to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) to challenge Fifa’s ruling on their protest.

While nobody at Safa has made that comment in the aftermath of Fifa’s announcement, Motlanthe did mention the possibility of approaching CAS a few days ago. He was commenting on Fifa's stony silence while Safa was awaiting the outcome.

“There are a lot of things they are dealing with. If they don’t give you a good reason, you can still go and challenge the matter with CAS. So, they rather do their work, and we give them the space.”

Yesterday, Safa president Danny Jordaan and Motlanthe would not be drawn to comment on Addo’s remarks or the organisation’s next step. However, Jordaan told Independent Media that Safa will meet on December 10 to decide on the line of action.