Some 18 members of the Executive Committee (ExCo) of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) are said to have benefited from a whopping $36,000 made available by the GFA for committee members who did not get the opportunity to travel to Brazil for the World Cup.
But a group among the beneficiaries are still unhappy with the package in comparison with what was spent on their colleagues who were taken to Brazil.
According to one of them who spoke to the Graphic Sports, prior to the World Cup, the GFA, at one of its executive committee meetings, made it clear that it would not be able to fly all the 22 ExCo members as was the case in Ghana’s two previous World Cup appearances in Germany 2006 and South Africa 2010 respectively.
In view of the recent arrangement, the source said, each member of the committee was paid $2,000 as compensation for their inability to fly to Brazil.
In 2006, a number of FA officials were flown to Germany and accommodated, but there was a stand-off over per diem allowance. Consequently, some officials were sacrificed by the committee and the Regional Football Associations (RFAs) during the elections for their stand on the matter.
The aggrieved members insisted that considering the amount spent on the members who were privileged to be flown to Brazil, which would be in the region of $6,000, (covering airfare to Armsterdam, through Miami in the USA, to Brazil and back to Ghana), they fell cheated.
This amount, aside of their feeding and accommodation, would be deducted from Ghana’s gross share of $8million for appearing at the World Cup.
Interestingly, the source said some of these officials ultimately benefited from the $100,000 paid to both players and officials and the Black Stars as appearance fees.