His suspension by the South African Football Association (Safa) was unlawful in terms of his service agreement, national soccer coach Shakes Mashaba contended in the Johannesburg High Court on Tuesday.
”The agreement does not provide for or permit my suspension by Safa. Consequently the suspension is unlawful,” he said in court papers lodged in support of an application for a reversal of the association’s decision.
”By suspending me, Safa makes it impossible for me to comply with its contractual requirement to remedy the alleged breaches.”
The matter stood down to Thursday for Safa to file answering papers.
But, legal representatives for both parties indicated to Judge Sunita Snyders that an out-of-court settlement may be on the cards.
Mashaba’s suspension last Wednesday came on the eve of Bafana Bafana’s departure for Mauritius for a Cosafa Cup match as part of their build-up for the African Nations Cup finals.
Safa acting chief executive officer Albert Mokoena announced at the time that the body’s executive committee had decided to suspend Mashaba for seven days for breach of contract.
The committee found the coach had failed to monitor and identify all national player information by selecting players for the national squad that were injured or that had not played for their respective clubs for long periods.
Also, he had ”failed to use his best endeavours to promote the interest of the national team, resulting in players retiring early from the national team”.
Mashaba had to remedy the problems within a week or face losing his job.
The coach asked the court to set aside ”my summary suspension without a hearing”.
He described in court papers how he was informed via telephone of Safa’s decision by Mokoena last Wednesday afternoon: ”He asked whether he could read the outcome of an NEC [national executive committee] meeting to me before I heard about it in the press.”
He was ”shocked and somewhat dazed” by the news, Mashaba’s papers state.
”The letter of suspension was the first I heard of the accusations.”
Mashaba denies breaching his service agreement.
The coach has been criticised for an apparent inflexible approach to overseas-based players joining the African Nations Cup squad later than Saturday’s deadline.
He refused a request to allow striker Benni McCarthy of Portuguese club Porto and Charlton Athletic defender Mark Fish to join the camp later this month. McCarthy resigned from international soccer as a result and Fish withdrew from the squad to travel to Tunisia after being selected in Mashaba’s 22-man squad named last month.
Striker Shaun Bartlett has also recently retired.
Regarding criticism of the inclusion of David Kannemeyer and George Koumantarakis in his African Nations Cup squad, Mashaba said he would have ordered medical examinations of them both and would have subjected them to fitness tests.
Safa apparently believed the two men to be unfit.
The coach stands losing substantial amounts of money in performance bonuses if he is not reinstated. — Sapa