Randy Abbey has been accused of a ground-shaking crime of asking members of the Executive Committee of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) to fund the electoral campaign of the opposition NDC political party.
The shocking claim was made by radio sports analyst Edmund Ackah on Asempa FM’s Ultimate Sports show on Thursday who said that Abbey, who was then a member of the football body, asked members of the body to contribute money to aid John Mahama’s election campaign.
Abbey, who is a close friend of John Mahama, is alleged to have asked his fellow members of the powerful Executive Committee of the GFA to financially support the campaign to help the former Ghana leader win the general election in 2012.
The revelation, if true, shows Abbey clearly committed the cardinal sin of football as it violates FIFA’s rule of football body not dabbling politics while also angering the ruling NPP party because he used the national football body to solicit for funding for their opponents.
Even though the allegation does not suggest that funds of the GFA was solicited or being solicited for that purpose, the claim that meetings of football governing body was used to solicit funding political parties will raise serious concerns in many quarters.
The accuser did not reveal whether members of the Executive Committee, which was then dominated by businessmen, contributed the money required by Randy Abbey to oil the NDC campaign.
Another uncertainty was if indeed they contributed the cash whether the money reached the NDC as there were no acknowledgements of any cash being received by the political party or the leader John Mahama.
Ackah, who made the allegation on during the radio programme, seems to have angered by the recent spate of public attacks by Abbey on GFA leader Kwesi Nyantakyi with the latter castigating his former boss in the media.
Abbey used to be one of the close henchmen of Nyantakyi until he lost an election to go onto the Emergency Committee before turning against his boss accusing the GFA leader of not supporting him to go onto the powerful body.
With Nyantakyi announcing his decision not to contest the 2019 polls, Abbey has stepped up attacks on the GFA leader with scathing claims which seems to have sparked the riposte from Ackah.
“Randy Abbey claims he is the person to solve problems in Ghana football. He should be the last person to speak. He has no moral authority over football matters,” Ackah said on Asempa FM.
“This Randy Abbey was neck-deep in the affairs of federation and today he is deviously trying to make certain claims against Kwesi Nyantakyi just for political capital over the GFA leadership position.
“Isn’t this the same man who asked members of the Executive Committee to contribute their own monies to John Mahama’s campaign during a meeting of the GFA?
“In this country we won’t allow such people to come and deceive claiming they are the best people for football. We have got long memories and as long as we are alive we won’t allow such people to deceive to the public.”
The revelation is bound to anger the currently ruling government of the NPP while bringing to the fore what past administrators of football sought to use the game for political ends.
With the 2019 elections looming and Nyantakyi declaring his intention not to contest several interests have come up to boil with some seeking to damage each other with media campaigns.
Abbey has posited himself as a powerbroker in Ghana football and declaring himself as the person to offer support to any contestant to wrest control of the governing body.
The Heart of Lions bankroller has long been suspected by Nyantakyi loyalists of being behind what they call ‘paid-for’ media attacks on some particular radio stations in Accra and Kumasi on the CAF Vice President mostly through a particular group of journalists – a claim Abbey has denied.
Nyantakyi is also on a warpath with some of those journalists who have persistently attacked him with some ridiculous claims resulting in him going to court with Patrick Osei Agyemang of Asempa FM and Kofi Asare Brako then of Asempa FM and their media company Multimedia Broadcasting Limited.
The owners of the radio station are begging Nyantakyi for an out-of-court settlement with a huge sum of money as compensation.
The next to go to court to answer libel charges again is Kofi Asare Brako as well as Saddick Obama Adams and Abraham 'One Man Supporter' Boakye and their radio station Atinka FM for several damaging claims.
Court documents seen by this website indicates Nyantakyi will demand $2.5m in damages.