"Money palaver" rocks GFA

The former Chairman of the Ghana Football Association (GFA), Alhaji MND Jawula (right of PIC), is at the centre of a scandal involving the sum of $128,604 which had not been accounted for.

The Crusading Guide’s investigations have established that the money was to cover the cost of air tickets for a friendly ‘A’ match between Egypt and Ghana originally scheduled to be played in Egypt on 26 or 27 May 2000 and another one scheduled for Athens, the capital city of Greece.

The letter written on 13 April 2000 by the then GFA General Secretary, Mr W.K. Agrah, to his Egyptian counterpart had stated that instead of 30 tickets the GFA had proposed that the Egyptian FA should send to them (GFA), an amount of $45,000 to cover the cost of the tickets. The money, according to the letter, was to reach the GFA latest by 10 May 2000 “to enable us purchase the tickets.”

“Instead of 30 tickets, we propose you send to us $45,000 to cater for the tickets. Experience has shown that we usually require re-routing for our Europe-based players and that creates problems when we don’t handle the tickets ourselves,” W.K. Agrah had explained.

In another letter, the GFA had indicated that a cheque numbered 50351, dated 29 June 2000 presented to it could not be cashed and therefore requested the Egyptian FA to provide $45,000 to Mr Khamatey of Ghana Mission, Cairo for onward transmission to it (GFA).

Further investigations revealed that upon a fax received by the GFA dated 16 November 1999, its Management Board preferred receiving another $20,447 in cash instead of bank transfer because of alleged anticipated problems associated with such transfers. “The Management Board of the Football Association prefers receiving US$20,447 in cash instead of by bank transfer because of anticipated problems associated with such transfer,” former GFA boss, Alhaji Jawula wrote in his 18 November 1999 letter to the General Secretary of the Egyptian Football Association.

The amount was to be collected from Gen M. El Deeh, General Secretary of the Egyptian Football Association by the same Alhaji Khamatey.

Regarding the friendly match billed for Athens early 2000, the GFA had requested for $63,157 from Hellenic Football Federation instead of tickets. One Mr Alex Asante, who was to arrive at Athens on 29 February 2000 had been authorised to collect the money on behalf of the GFA.

Another letter The Crusading Guide intercepted, written by Mr Agra said that an international friendly match between Ghana and Egypt was to come off and that Ghana’s team had been booked to arrive in Cairo on Thursday 15 June 2000 by Egyptian flight MS 856 from Accra. In addition to that Alhaji Jawula was expected in Cairo from 27-30 May 2000 for the CAF Inter-Clubs meeting and “we kindly ask you to contact him and hand over the amount of forty-five thousand dollars ($45,000) to him (cost of airfares)…”

After waiting in vain without any account being rendered by Alhaji Jawula and his team of administrators, the GFA, through its current General Secretary, Mr Kofi Nsiah, wrote to him (Jawula) referring to the three financial transactions executed between 1999 and 2000 totalling $128,604. Three good letters were sent to the ex-GFA boss requesting him to throw more light on the transactions before he sent his response to the GFA.

In his reaction, which was contained in a letter dated 12 April 2002, Alhaji Jawula stated that as far as he could recall those friendly matches were sponsored by the two associations (He did not specify which of them). “I am doing my best to recall receipts and documents related to the two events. You will appreciate that since the documentations concern players at home and abroad, it is taking me awhile to assemble them for your information,” he claimed.

Armed with the findings on the $128,604 saga, The Crusading Guide contacted the former GFA boss who, preferring not to be recorded on tape, submitted that instead of the $45,000 that the then GFA requested, they received only $20,000 from the Egyptian Football Association as tickets money.

Asked why they (GFA) preferred cash to cheque, he said that the cheques that were usually given to the GFA bounced, hence the need to request for cash. On why those monies were not captured in the GFA accounts, Alhaji Jawula said, “It is not income for the GFA but airfares. I cannot account for it because the tickets have been used.” He said, adding that, “it was not captured in the GFA accounts because there was no appearance fee.”

Alhaji Jawula pressed on to say that since no money was paid to the Football Association in that reciprocal match (Egypt, Ghana match) it must not be captured in the GFA accounts.

“Somebody must have an interest to blow headlines and embarrass me. What is the interest of anybody? Somebody wants to damage me. Anas (the paper’s reporter), I am wondering why somebody should show interest in that? He submitted. He added that the flight took place and the match was honoured with Ghana winning by two goals to one against the Egyptians.

On the Greece (Hellenic) and Ghana (Black Stars) encounter, Alhaji reiterated that all monies due Ghana was duly paid ($63,000). The former GFA boss said since the money was paid to the airlines he would require some efforts to reconcile the two (Egyptian and Greece matches). “I am not supposed to account for the monies to the GFA but to the airlines,” he stressed.