Opinion: $15,000 bonus brouhaha is completely misplaced

Germany - $2,500, Eygpt - $3,500, Brazil - $7,000, England - $6,800, Argentina - $9,000, Holland - $4,100, Ivory Coast - $8,500, GHANA - $15,000, Senegal - $8,000, Burkina Faso - $4,000, Algeria - $6,300, Cameroon - $5,500, Nigeria - $5,000, Sweden - $2,000, Japan - $6,000, Ethiopia - $2,000, Belgium - $9,000, France - $5,500, USA - $7,000, Mexico - $7,800.

Yes you noted it, that Ghana’s $15,000 payout should the Black Stars emerge victorious on Tuesday stands tall among the above selected national football teams and their winning bonuses in US Dollars.

And it is also worth noting the high standards of living in this country and the hard times for the ordinary man on the streets. But it still remains baffling why Ghanaians have chosen to attack the increment of the winning bonus of the national team players to the staggering amount because according to the sponsors, it’s a motivation to the players to go the extra mile to ensure victory for Ghana and ultimately qualification to next summer’s global football fiesta scheduled for Brazil.

Who will like to miss out on the FIFA World Cup on the land of the nation acknowledged to play the most beautiful football all over the world? So if the best way to encourage the Black Stars to up their game and overcome what clearly is the toughest of opponents is to increase their pay which the paymaster are willing to give, why the fuss? Perhaps those criticizing the new hike in player bonuses are new to the Ghana national team and the quest to qualify for football’s World Cup since the country first attempted to join the global football mega party way back in 1960 for Chile’62. Nine times, Ghana attempted, nine times Ghana got an empty return until the nation proved 10th time lucky with the success of Germany 2006.

And you know the big secret? Money was the biggest motivation. From then President, John Agyekum Kufuor, Sports Minister, Yaw Osafo-Maafo through to prominent citizens like the Asantehene Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, all the biggets companies you can think of, even the German Ambassador to Ghana, everybody solicited for funds for the national team wherever.

In the event, the Black Stars winning bonuses received astronomical increases time and again. And you know the result? Ghana earned a first World Cup berth in 2006. Before Goldfields Ghana Limited came on board with their 3-year $3m sponsorship package, the Black Stars never took home more than $3,000 as winning bonus but all changed because Goldfields came in with the cash to truly shape the World Cup dream. When the Black Stars received an unprecedented $4,000 for beating Burkina Faso 2-1 in Kumasi in the first qualifier under Goldfields’ sponsorship, the amount was soon doubled for must win 2-0 conquest of Bafana Bafana in SA two weeks later. The victory was delivered with aplomb by the legendary Stephen Appiah and his lads.

With qualification in sight, Minister Osafo Maafo declared that it would not be wise to reduce the winning bonuses for the last two qualifiers even though he cautioned the players not to be motivated by money per se, but by hunger for success, the yearn to be the first Ghanaian players to qualify the nation for the World Cup and the enormous opportunities they could get form playing at the World Cup. After paying out the $8,000 for the home win over Uganda and later Cape Verde, each player was given an additional $10,000 qualification bonus. The coach, Ratomir Dujkovic was not left out as his bonuses fattened game after game and he pocketed a cool $450,000 qualification bonus.

So you see, we started paying them as much as much $8,000 way back in 2005, that’s exactly 8 years ago. No need to point out when exactly the amount got increased to $10,000 if it was in Germany 2006 or CAN 2008 but the Black Stars have remained on that amount for years before new sponsors, GNPC now deem it necessary to increase it to the $15,000 we are all crying about. No way am I defending this amount because you may not even be aware how just 1% of this amount could enrich my pocket but it’s worth calling a spade a spade. The Black Stars’ level of work deserves that pay especially when they have sponsors willing to dish out the cash. Everybody deserves a pay worth their work and considering the high standard of living in Ghana, you can be assured that this $15,000 cannot even match up to the demands on these players.

It’s amazing that in a country where we cry daily over low wages, we can still find time to wail over a group of workers who are lucky to be in a job where they could get wages quite substantial for many of us. It’s also the same country where everybody who knows any of these players in anyway, almost always expects some financial gift from them whenever they meet them. Do you know the salaries of some doctors, MDs and even our MPs? My friends let’s not be hypocrites because our brother or uncle is not one of Kwesi Appiah’s men in camp now.

What we should be focusing is on is how to support the Black Stars to beat Egypt on Tuesday and eventually qualify for Brazil 2014.