The Ghana Football Association will distribute a total of $1.8 million to Ghanaian men and women football clubs, as well as male and female national teams, to help ease the financial burdens caused by the halt in football activities in the country.
The total amount is an amalgamation of the $1,000,000 in FIFA COVID Relief Fund, the $500,000 FIFA Women’s Football Relief Fund, and the $300,000 CAF Relief Fund.
This will be paid to clubs in two tranches; one to be released in July 2020 and the other to be paid in January 2021.
In all, 36 entities will benefit from the fund, ranging from GFA camera men to security services football.
Ghana Premier League clubs stand to benefit from a chunk of the money with each club allocated $15,000 with $10,000 to be released immediately, and $5,000 to come in January 2021. In all, $270,000 will go to the 18 Premier League clubs.
Each of the 48 Division One League clubs will get $7,500 while the 16 elite Women’s League Clubs will get $10,000 each.
A sum of $50,000 will go into the payment of referees, who have complained of unpaid arrears in the past while GFA camera men and women stand to benefit from a $40,000 allocation.
In terms of national teams, the women’s senior national team, the Black Queens, have been allocated the bigger chunk, with the team set to pocket $60,000.
The Black Stars have been allocated $17,000 while the Beach Soccer team will take home $10,000
The Competitions Management Committees have also been allocated a part of the money with the Premier League Management Committee given $40,000, Division One League Management $50,000, Women’s League Management $60,000 and Beach Soccer League Management $15,000.
The 10 Regional Football Associations will be given $10,000 each.
There’s a $58,000 allocation to the National Juvenile Football Festival with an extra $50,000 allocated for 1st and 2nd prizes for the winner of the Regional Juvenile Leagues.
Other stakeholders that stand to benefit are GHALCA -$2,000, Match Commissioners – $34,000, venue Media Officers – $20,000, security services football- $2000, PFAG -$2,000 among others.
An amount of $26,000 will go into the mandatory enrollment of players onto the National Health Insurance Scheme.
It is not clear which category of players this will benefit from this initiative.
While the majority of the payments look routine, certain allocations have raised eyebrows.
For example, there’s a $7,000 allocation for Media Capacity Building, but it is unclear if the money will go into training external journalists or GFA’s own media department.
There is also $58,000 that will go to the National Juvenile Football Festival but not much is known of the competition – when or where it will take place and the format it will take.
Conspicuously missing in the distribution is any budgetary allocation for the GFA’s Communications Department, which is believed to be heavily under-resourced. –Citinewsroom
