OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Thursday 10.30am.
SPORTS Minister Ngconde Balfour has given the South African Football Association an ultimatum to sort out its ongoing sagas and get it’s house in order or the government will intervene.
“If Safa fails to put in place systems within this period to clean up football, government will step in, even if it means introducing enabling legislation to regulate the sport,” Balfour told a press conference on Friday. “Safa has further been advised to submit a report to me no later than January 31, 2000, detailing how government’s concerns with football have been addressed by them as the controlling body,” he said after meeting the Safa executive at Johannesburg International Airport.
There has been concern that the Rothmans Cup saga, the feuding between top league bosses, shots allegedly being fired at PSL boss Joe Ndhlela’s home and the kidnapping, and release of Moroka Swallows coach Walter da Silva, will have an impact on South Africa’s chances of hosting the 2006 World Cup.
SA’s World Cup Committee chief executive Danny Jordaan, in Auckland for the under17 world championships, laughed off these suggestions that the local crisis would affect the bid.