GHALCA Reform Committee to submit report next week

The seven-man committee tasked by the Ghana League Clubs Association (GHALCA) to review the Ghana Football Association (GFA) statutes is scheduled to submit its report next week.

According to the chairman of the committee, Mr Jones Alhassan-Abu, the group would finalise its work during a three-day retreat in Takoradi from Friday to Sunday.

In an interview with the Daily Graphic yesterday, Mr Alhassan-Abu disclosed that the retreat would be hosted by Mr Wilson Arthur, who is a member of the committee, as well as the CEO of Division One side, Skyy FC.

He said the committee was only left with the fine-tuning of two thematic areas — corporate governance and the format for the various league — today and tomorrow, after which they would move to Takoradi to put together the final report.

He hinted that the committee would present the report to the GHALCA executives next week, after which a general meeting would be convened for the clubs to discuss and adopt the report as a working document.

He explained that after endorsing it, GHALCA would then present it to the Normalisation Committee formed by FIFA to run the GFA for its consideration.

He stated that the report would be of great benefit to the Normalisation Committee considering the amount of work which had gone into it.

Chief among the Normalisation Committee’s duties as directed by FIFA, is to review the GFA statutes in line with Article 15 of the FIFA Statutes, and Mr Alhassan-Abu believes the quantum of work done by his team would go a long way to ease the burden of the Normalisation Committee in that regard.

Mr Alhassan-Abu noted that the clubs, which were the main stakeholders of Ghana football, represented about 80 per cent of the GFA congress, hence the need to fully support the Normalisation Committee to succeed in the interest of the entire nation.

He said apart from the clubs, the other congress members such as the Professional Footballers Association of Ghana (PFAG), referees, juvenile football, women’s football and schools might also be engaged by the group for their respective inputs.

He stressed that the Dr Kofi Amoah-led group, which had been mandated by FIFA to run the GFA for the next six months, reserved the right to decide what to do with the proposals to be submitted by the various constituent bodies.

The GHALCA Reform Committee, which includes Messrs George Amoako, Randy Abbey, Oloboi Commodore, Emmanuel Larbi Amoah, Agbesi Dzakpasu and a late addition, Samuel Oduro Nyarko, with Accra Hearts of Oak’s Mark Noonan as an ex-officio member, also reviewed the GFA Statutes and the Disciplinary Code.