Odi Ahenkan Kwame Yeboah and John Mahama
Odi Ahenkan Kwame Yeboah, a presenter with the Despite Media group has questioned the sincerity of John Dramani Mahama’s promise to revamp the Ghana Premier League if given the nod as President in the 2024 general elections.
Odi Ahenkan stated on Okay FM that John Mahama’s promise cannot be welcomed as he failed to address the challenges of Ghana football in his first spell as president of the country.
Odi Ahenkan referenced the 2014 World Cup debacle as a point of validation for his position that John Mahama cannot be trusted to turn around the fortunes of Ghana football.
He argues that when the John Mahama administration was flying money to Brazil to pay the appearance fees to Black Stars players, the Ghana Premier League was in shambles and that the money could have been invested in the local league.
“We have to remind John Mahama of the airlifting of monies to Brazil under his watch. It was during his time that we flew money from Ghana to Brazil to pay Black Stars players.
"At the time they were doing that, the Ghana league had collapsed. What he is saying is nothing new. If Mahama is promising to build the local league then we need to question him about why his government airlifted monies to Brazil.”
John Mahama, in one of his campaign tours, proposed the implementation of a sporting plan that will ensure that the Black Stars is built around players in the Ghana Premier League which will mark a departure from the practice of having foreign-based players dominate the team.
John Mahama’s position is established on the premise that a strong Ghana Premier League will produce players quality enough to battle other national teams.
"We will build the new Black Stars based on homegrown players," Mahama asserted. "Domestic players who have trained together for a long time and work as a team, and then we will bring in the foreign ones to blend with them."
EK
