Joy Sports has posed ten key questions to Sports Minister Isaac Kwame Asiamah after briefing Parliament on how US$ 4.5 million was expended on the Black Stars for the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations.
The sector minister claimed the country budgeted US$ 6.3million and thus, an amount of $1.7million was not spent.
- CAF caters to the needs of each team's players and technical team during the tournament. How many technical team members did team Ghana present?
- In 2017, the Black Stars were convinced to take a $5,000 winning bonus. Why couldn't we do same this time?
- CAF gave each participating nation $260K for preparation. Why was that amount not factored into the minister's presentation?
- Ghana won just a game but paid winning bonuses of over $965K for players. Does it mean each player got about $42K?
- Ghana has a culture of paying the Black Stars appearance fees before tournaments. Did it happen again? If so, how much?
- The minister's presentation said the $6.3m budget covered NINE categories of people, but the actual breakdown mentioned expenses incurred for only the players and technical team. What happened to expenses for the other seven groups?
- The entire sports ministry budget for 2019 is GHS 43m ($7.9m), but the AFCON budget alone was GHS 34m or $6.3m (representing 79% of the total amount). How does the state justify that expense when many other sports urgently need help?
- Joy Sports understands that the AFCON expenditure was taken from outside the sports ministry's budgetary allocation? What was the source of the money?
- Budgets, by definition, are presented before expenses are made. Why did parliament not demand this be done by the sports ministry before the AFCON?
- Who constitutes 'additional technical staff' in the minister's budget, and why are their per diem/winning bonus payments separate from 'technical staff'?