SAFA Tshwane Extra-Ordinary Congress Gets Abondoned

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The SAFA Tshwane Extra-Ordinary Congress that was scheduled for the 8th of September 2018 has been abandoned. This is as a result of failure to have the Agenda proposals accepted by the Regional Executive Committee during the meeting itself.

The meeting, which was called as a crises meeting prior the Ordinary Congress, did not have the Agenda items that the affiliates requested. Somehow, the Regional Executive Committee wanted to turn this meeting into a preparatory meeting for the Elective Congress, where the agenda was dominated by the elective framework discussions and adoptions.

Earlier in the year when the region was set to hold the Ordinary Congress on the 7th of July 2918, PLFA and four other LFAs observed that there were violations which should not be allowed to get to the Ordinary Congress in their then nature. PLFA wrote to the region to postpone the Ordinary Congress in order to have these matters dealt with first, and to instead hold an Extra-ordinary Congress as a platform to address such issues.

PLFA raised the following issues:

• disregard Article 72.2 of its Constitution when reporting its finances based on incorrect financial periods. For quite some time SAFA Tshwane has been reporting on the finances of the region based on a January to December period. Article 72.2 says:

“The financial period of SAFA TSHWANE shall be one (1) year and shall begin on 1 July and end on 30 June in each year”

 

• disregard of Article 27.1 of SAFA Tshwane’s Constitution when convening Ordinary Congresses during the incorrect time periods. For quiet some time SAFA Tshwane has been convening Ordinary Congresses during April / May months. Article 27.1 says:

“The Regional Secretary/Regional Executive Officer shall, by registered post or telefax, give all Members at least ninety (90) days advance notice of the date of the Ordinary Congress, which date shall be determined by the Regional Executive Committee and shall ordinarily be a date in September”

 

• Skip a year without a Congress in 2014, and thus causing confusion with regards to the sequence of Quadrennial Congresses which originally flowed from 2006 and with four year intervals there-from. Since 2014 was skipped, it is not clear whether the same four year intervals are being upheld, in that the next Quadrennial Congress will be in this year (2018). Alternatively, could the sequence have been shifted given that the current Executive Committee was elected in 2015, and if the next Quadrennial Congress will be in 2019.

 

In requesting that instead an Extra-Ordinary Congress be held, the business of Extra-Ordinary Congress being sought would therefore have the following in the agenda:

• To discuss, deal with, and correct the financial reporting periods.
• To discuss, deal with, and correct ordinary time set for which Ordinary Congresses must be convened.
• To discuss, deal with, and correct the Quadrennial Congresses sequence.

 

Subsequent to this, PLFA sent a letter to the region on the 23rd of July 2018 to:

• request for the region to provide its members with the Financial Statements for 2017 financial year. These would have been the statements to be considered at the Ordinary Congress that was to take place on the 7th of July, which the region did not send to the affiliates at all;and
• request that the scrutinizing of the financial reports be added on the Agenda of the ensuing Extra-Ordinary Congress.

This letter too was not considered. Instead, the Agenda put forward by the region was as follows:

1. Opening and Welcome;
2. Declaration of Compliance in the Convening of the Meeting;
3. Approval of the Credentials;
4. Appointment of Scrutineers;
5. Alignment of SAFA Statutes;
6. Electoral Code;
7. Electoral Code of Conduct;
8. Electoral Committee;
9. Electoral Appeal Committee;
10. Financial Policy;
11. Announcements and Closure.

The above agenda is blatantly ignorant of the issues raised, issues that led to the postponement of the Ordinary Congress and the convening of the Extra-Ordinary Congress.

PLFA is of the view that the region is avoiding accounting for its omissions, non-compliance and misappropriation of the regional funds. It thus tried to hide these in the alignment of the constitutiion to the national standard, and push through its electoral framework so that focus can be diverted from the pertinent issues.

So PLFA led the charge prior to the declaration of compliance Agenda items during the Extra-ordinary Congress, requesting that the region clarify against which constitution does the region want to declare compliance, and demand that the original issues raised for the calling of the Extra-ordinary Congress be added on the Agenda. The region refused, citing that it did not prepare for those issues, and thus leading to the collapse of the meeting, which means technical the meeting was abandoned.

PLFA Executive Committee will be meeting on the 9th of September at its Ordinary Executive Committee meeting, and will have as part of its Agenda the debriefing of the SAFA Tshwane’s abandoned Congress.  From this the EXCO will deliberate on the way forward, and will engage other LFAs in finding solutions to the region’s problems.

In a nutshell, the region has not held the Ordinary Congress to close off year 2017, which it reports on incorrectly financially in terms of periods, that it from January to December instead of July to June. Instead of focusing on issues that should rectify these issues, the region was focused on elections and overlooking accountability on the financial report. We trust that in its urgent Regional Executive Committee, the region will reflect and do the right thing for the sake of football.

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