FRIDAY, 3.30PM:
The troubled SA Rugby Football Union (Sarfu) had to explain its finances on Friday, after the Afrikaans daily Beeld revealed a shortfall of R16 million.
An angry Rian Oberholzer said the rugby board would have made a profit of R16 million for the year to September, but was obliged to pay out R32 million to the 14 provincial unions, some of which would have “collapsed” without the assistance. Sarfu made the allocations on the basis of guaranteed income from long-term contracts, including its 10-year television rights agreement with Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation.
Beeld said the Sarfu finance committee had only met twice this year, in January, and again last week., and that the union had had to resort to its overdraft facilities to pay its bills.
Oberholzer denied that Sarfu operated on an overdraft, but said that it did periodically make use of the facility. He accused ‘individuals’ in the union of attempting to discredit Sarfu for their own personal gain.
“As a result, media reports are inaccurate because they do not provide a balanced account of the reasons behind Sarfu’s financial performance.” On Tuesday next week, the rugby union faces its tensest moment, with a vote on the first serious challenge to the presidency of Louis Luyt.