Afriyie Ankrah, $9.6 Million "No Wo Hen"?

The Sports Ministry budgeted $9.6 million for the Blackstars participation towards the ongoing World cup competition to the GFA. At the time this was thought to be a good idea so that the Players will adequately be catered for. I personally wrote articles against such a huge budget since Blackstars had already been given $1.5 million preparation money which is given to all the 32 qualified country's FA .

This $1.5 million is in addition to the $8 million the FIFA was going to give to each of the 32 participating teams. The Sports Ministry $9.6 million to the GFA would have made sense if it was a loan to GFA to be paid back after GFA had received the the promised $8 million from FIFA as was done in 2006 and 2010 but surprisingly, in Mahama's administration where corruption has become legitimate part of government, this money was a free money to GFA.

The problem with this transaction is that, we don't know how this huge amount of money ended up since the GFA didn't pay the Players APPEARANCE FEES which every player in the 32 teams participating in the competion receive. Some players in other countries receive as much as $250,000 each depending how far the country goes in the competition because the further you go, the initial $8 million goes up. The winner of the world cup will receive $35 million. For instance, Ghana received $14 million in 2010 for reaching the round of eight or quarter finals but we were told of $11 million the amount paid for qualifying to the knockout stage.

FIFA does not pay this initial money upfront because it doesn't know how far each team will go in this competition. I think the semi finalist in 2010 competition received $18 million and $4 million is how much Uruguayan Suarez handball cost Ghana.

The Players should have been paid before the Players played Netherlands and way before it went to Miami U.S.A.

The GFA also was paid appearance fees for the match against Netherlands and the Korea friendly matches, how much we were paid is only known between Kwesi Nyantakyi and his Sports Minister friend Afriyie Ankrah. Where is that money?

The so called 13 Ambassadors supposedly were able to raise over $2 million which John Dumelo, one of the Ambassadors told Ghanaians and each one of them was given $20,000 to go to Brazil to cheer the team up. We did not see even one of the 13 people or the 500 supporters at the stadium in our last match against Portugal because the 47 officials accompanying the team could not arrange transportation.

Mr Afriyie Ankrah, where is the $9.6 million, the $2 million raised by the Ambassadors and the appearance fees we received for playing Netherlands and Korea. Select committee of Sports in Parliament should drag Nyantakyi and Afriyie Ankrah to the committee not to smirch their reputation s but to find the truth.

Justice Sarpong

(CARDINAL of TRUTH)