Blame Ghana FA for fallen standards – Referees’ chief barks

The Chairman of the Western Region Chapter of the Referees’ Association of Ghana (RAG), Richard Atiffu has spit venom at the Ghana Football Association for their failure to help develop referees in the country.

According to the retired FIFA referee, the Kwesi Nyantakyi-led body is a catalyst in the fallen standards of refereeing in Ghana.

Ghanaian referees have often been tagged as no-hopers by many local football fans and such claims gained deep roots earlier this week when news broke on FIFA banning Referee Joseph Lamptey for life.

Lamptey’s sin, according to world’s football governing body was breaching Article 69 paragraph 1 of the FIFA Disciplinary Code which touches on unlawfully influencing match results.

The game in question had to do with a 2018 world cup qualifier between South Africa and Senegal.

Reacting to this, the Western Region referees chief believes the Ghana FA has done little to help uplift the standards of the knights of the whistle.

In an exclusive interview with Empire FM, he said:

“The referees Association of Ghana with its small contribution from members try to develop referees and we use them in our leagues and now we come back and say referees are not performing.”

“When going for the world cup, referees leave for camping 2-3months to be trained for the tournament only. It tells you what FIFA want; they just want to reduce the human error that comes into refereeing to the barest minimum.”

“But what we (Ghana FA) do is watch the game and at the end of the day we say the referee is not good, but nobody trains the referees,” he added.

Richard Atiffu further stressed that the system of evaluating referees in Ghana falls short of international standards.

He also quizzed the Ghana FA on the whereabouts of a $5000 cash from FIFA given annually to member associations for referees development.

He lamented: “After every tournament, there is a technical Committee of CAF who will write a report on refereeing. FIFA does same and they share it with all instructors.”

“When you evaluate and you play the clips, then you use whatever areas where development should be to develop the referees.”

“Here, we don’t have referees development. FIFA sends $5000 every year; you can go and ask the GFA where is that money, it’s for referees development,” he concluded.