By: Nana Ampomah
I do not believe there is any country in the world associated with the Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) that has not commenced the new season of their national annual football league for the year 2015 to 2016.
Let us do a thorough search through the comity of football-loving nations and see for ourselves whether there is another land apart from our own that is exhibiting the same delay as far as our football is concerned.
I have spent sleepless nights thinking and praying over what is happening to our football front, why it should happen and how we could avoid such disgraceful episode which must force everybody in this country to bend his or her head in shame.
Of course, if a donor nation could grow into a beggar entity where we could accept the entry of the Chinese with their excavators into our lands to turn all the fertile soil upside-down in search of gold and shamefully accept Fulani and their herd of cattle to grace on our farm lands for a piece of cola, then we must know the depth of our downward trend in poverty.
Where are we heading to as a nation, sinking so low to the whims and caprices of people who ran to us for food and financial assistance even in the colonial days. Are we going forward ever, and backward never, as was drummed into our ears by the politicians?
Today, we are doing things so negatively as if there are no rules and regulations governing our game, and have become the laughing stock of those who came to us to seek wisdom and breathe our fresh air which God bestowed on this land.
Why, Ghana why? I tell you, whether we like it or not, signs of looming danger is pointing at us, and it calls for drastic measures, a total re-baptism of the Land.
Yes, as a matter of urgency, we must find a positive solution, however expensive it would be, something that calls for extreme bravery and stout-mindedness. We must certainly agree that somebody somewhere committed an unpardonable error and the result is what has plunged this lovely land of ours into this darkness, and today everybody is suffering and blaming each other.
If we don't find solution today, clearly, everything will be back-sliding, physically, economically, socially, politically and posterity will blame us for our ineptitude.
Of course, everybody everywhere is wondering how come that apart from this lovely country of ours, all others have the bragging right to say that their games are going on smoothly, and they are collecting meagre gate fees to feed their hungry players and making things smooth for the progress of the game.
We Africans love sport particularly football and even die for it, and if we find it impossible to get out of negativity, that things are sinking, then we must draw closer to the three wings of governance, the Executive, the Legislature and the Judiciary and pronounce that no interference would be entertained as is enshrined in the FIFA regulations and allow the game to have its independence, even if the nation takes glory in the successes of the game.
FIFA itself has its Executive, Legislature and Judiciary, independent of all national and international arrangements and their general rules do not allow any interference by any higher authority but where ubiquitous legal brains seek to cash in on the game and are allowed to enter the chambers of the game, then there looms all the danger as we are finding ourselves today.
Since football is time-bound and has its period of commencement and final declaration of champions, promotion to higher divisions and demotion to the lower, it is up to football people to steer clear out of normal Courts of Jurisdiction and the expectation is that the Judicial and Disciplinary Committees of the local association must be above board, and their rulings must be unquestionable, totally devoid of partisanship, bribery, corruption, nepotism and tribal sentiments.
And can we ensure that cases of misunderstanding can be rightly determined in this our era where hunger and poverty and love for possessions are forcing people to sell their birthright?
Sincerely, if we continue in this way without trust in our own rules and regulations, then we must ask whether we are getting closer to the advanced soccer nations which can tell you in advance what will happen to their league calendar, when the next two years will start and end.
Those of us who lived to see the English, Scottish, and Australian Football Pools in the 1950s and 60s, do remember how things were operating from year to year, before the National Football Pools Authority took over and did their own thing haphazardly and finally collapsed everything. The Football Pools in the advanced system is still going on, and their agents are still operating in some nearby countries around us, and I can tell you everything is going on intact.
I remember in my conversation with the newly-appointed Minister of Youth and Sports in those days when we were all working at the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), he sincerely agreed that this is truly a Land of Gold and deserved its name Gold Coast, and that we made a mistake in replacing that unique name with Ghana which could only be traced to the Sahara Desert.
I am happy that at this critical moment Hon. Nii Lamptey Vanderpuije will remember what we talked about over 30 years ago, and go near the President and possibly drum it into his mind.
And I believe President John Mahama will not throw out the idea of re-baptism as a prophecy coming out of "light-mindedness" as he said two years ago in the State of the Nation Address in Parliament!
Source: Graphic Sports