The National Communications Director of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) Sammy Gyamfi has said that football is the passion of the nation and therefore deserves all the support it needs to develop.
In what can be described as a rebuttal to the critics of his party’s promises for the football sector in Ghana, Sammy Gyamfi took to social media site Facebook to elucidate the myriad of opportunities that the football sector presents and therefore called for all the support it needs to take Ghana higher than its peers in the world of football.
The NDC in their “People’s Manifesto” have promised to set up a National Sports Fund that will support sports infrastructure development and also provide financial support for players in the Ghana Premier League Clubs in the form of monthly salary.
They have also promised to upgrade the National Sports College into a Sports University to train Ghanaian sportsmen and women in their chosen disciplines academically and on the field.
These among other promises has however, caught several people in awe with many doubting the ability of the NDC to carry out these.
The National Communications Director therefore called the critics to order in the post and sought to create an understanding for each of the strands in the manifesto on the sports related issues. Below is a full version of Sammy Gyamfi’s post on the matter on Facebook:
Football undoubtedly, is the passion of the nation, and a sport that has put and continues to put food on the tables of many of our country men and women. Indeed, Ghana football evokes such deep sense of national pride and also generates economic opportunities for thousands of Ghanaians, that any government worth its sort must support the growth, development and wellbeing of this most cherished sport.
The NDC recognizes the dire straits that our Sports Associations, particularly the Football fraternity and Premier League Clubs have endured in the past two years, first as a result of the disruption that was caused by the #12 investigations, and currently due to the debilitating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on Ghana football which has been halted since early this year.
This is why, H.E John Dramani Mahama, the Nation Builder, has among other things, committed himself to establishing a Sports Development Fund to promote sports in Ghana when elected.
Page 86, paragraph 7.6.1 (f) of the Peoples’ Manifesto reads;
We will…..; “use the Sports Development Fund to assist the Sports Associations to provide and improve remuneration and welfare of local sportsmen and women.”
Under this policy, any Premier League Club in need of financial assistance can among other things, apply for funds to remunerate their players and save their careers, sustain livelihoods and protect such clubs from going down.
As it has been the case for every other policy proposal contained in the NDC’s Peoples’ Manifesto, we have done the analysis and we know how much this social intervention will cost the nation and how we intend to fund it when elected.
For instance with regards to the Ghana Premier League which has a total of 18 football clubs, with an average of 22 players each, should government support each team with remuneration of GHS1,500 per player, it will cost the nation an amount of GHS594,000 ((i.e. GHS33,000 × 18 clubs) every month. In four (4) years, it will cost the nation a total amount of GHS28,512, 000 (i.e 594,000 × 48 months), equivalent to US$4.8 million dollars.
Any club which benefits from this intervention will be required to pay a small percentage of the transfer & sign-on fees of any of their players who gets a foreign contract into the revolving Sports Development Fund. This we believe will be prudent use of public funds to regenerate and boost an industry that feeds many and continues to be the breeding grounds for burgeoning talents who go on to lift the name of Ghana high on the global stage.
Did I hear the Nephew of President Akufo-Addo and Ghana’s De facto Prime Minister, Gabby Otchere Darko suggest that this laudable policy is not doable? For the records, the legal fees paid to Gabby Otchere Darko and his cronies under the stinking “Agyapa deal” alone can pay for this policy over a period of four (4) years, not to talk of the unprecedented waste of public funds we are witnessing under the obese and corrupt Akufo Addo-government.
Governance is all about choices and priorities. Whereas, President Akufo Addo prioritizes profligacy, cronyism, wastage and corruption, President Mahama, the Nation Builder has chosen to channel state resources into productive initiatives such as sports development for the benefit of the country. John Mahama is honest and can be trusted to deliver his promises. Naysayers and deliberate cynics like Gabby Otchere Darko who don’t appreciate the need for government to support our local sports clubs and associations because they believe such interventions should rather be channeled into crony family and friends deals to benefit a few, should be ignored and treated with the contempt they deserve.
Sammy Gyamfi Esq.
(National Communications Officer, NDC)
Story By: Edward A. Ken-zorre
