'Nyantakyi is a thief' – Journalist fumes after watching ‘Number 12’

Head of Sports at Atinka Media Village, Saddick Adams has been left perplexed and mortified by comments embattled president of the Ghana Football Association, Kwesi Nyantakyi made in the latest undercover documentary by ace investigative journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas.

Saddick Adams who has been an advocate for transparency and accountability in Ghana football has expressed shock with the ease with which Kwesi Nyantakyi who has been a practising lawyer for more than 15 years gave out classified information to undercover agents who masqueraded as businessmen.

Speaking to GhanaWeb after watching the 1 hour 30 minutes documentary, the ‘Sports Obama as he is known stated “We have been speaking about this thing for a long time but where will you get the evidence but for Tiger Eye. When I came out, I see people who are involved and I call them thieves because I’m in court to prove with evidence why I call the thieves. So if I go to see people taking money, I’m at will to call them thieves. If by tomorrow and these people are still in charge of Ghana football then some of us might quit this job and enter into that bribery business because that’s the most lucrative job according to Nyantakyi, he fumed.

The Editor of Sports at Accra-based Class FM, Kwame Dwomoh Agyemang shared similar sentiments as Saddick Adams.

According to the experienced broadcaster, the match fixing incidents captured in the expose’ will discourage and demotivate journalists and pundits who spend a lot of their time researching and making publications about the league.

“I could not for a moment imagine that quite a number of games that I have seen in the last one year or two years results were determined even before a game kick started. For me as a pundit and host of the same franchise we sit to discuss the games, thinking we are going to watch a fair game. Little did we know that all of these games were going to go in a certain way it was painful”.

Ghanaian referees are vulnerable

The Anas expose’ did not only uncover the rot in Ghana football but also the vulnerability of Ghanaian match officials, GBC’s Benjamin William Graham has said. Willie Graham expressed worry over how corruption has permeated through the fabric of the Ghanaian football and become normalized by the very people who have been given responsibility to protect the integrity of the game.

“Today we have seen how monies are parted to referees and how they are influenced to handle certain matches. We have seen referees taking bribes and praying to God that at least they are happy with the monies that they have earned. In all of this, I think our referees are particularly vulnerable. They are so vulnerable that anything you tell them, they are ready to do it for you. To the extent that members of the Match Review Panel and Referees appointment committee were ready to throw away their integrity to select referees that will compromise matches.”