Sport Minister Brent Sancho yesterday made it clear that his Ministry’s decision to suspend funding to the T&T Football Association (TTFA) was not a result of well publicised differences between himself and the executive of the national sporting organisation.
Instead, he said, it was simply to get the TTFA executive led by Raymond Tim Kee to communicate to taxpayers through the presentation of legitimate documents, how millions of dollars disbursed to it by the state was being used.
On Saturday, the ministry issued a media release which underscored its previous position and said national governing bodies (NGBs) of sport in receipt of funding from the Ministry of Sport and the Sports Company of Trinidad and Tobago (SPORTT) must have audited accounts in order to receive support from the Government.
When contacted Minister Sancho said, “Most of the sporting governing bodies seem to have some sort of accounting system of structure.”
Meanwhile, the TTFA in his view was delinquent.
Asked for which period his ministry wanted audited financial statements from the Tim Kee administration, the minister said, “I will take anything. I will take it from when they changed the name.”
The TTFA was formerly known as the T&T Football Federation. The name of the organisation was changed when Tim Kee became president in November 2012.
Sancho said, “At the end of the day, I am not trying to mind anybody’s business. I am responsible for administering tax-payers money. It is my responsibility to ensure that the entity that we are giving money to is A: financially prudent and B: can account for the money that they spend. We want to see what is their financial history in terms of how they have done things.”
He added, “The key is to bring all sporting governing bodies under one house in terms of auditing. Whether we use an accounting firm to do this or one person does all the accounts, so we will be consistent. That is the aim. I met with the Federation back in February. Then I met with the president (Raymond Tim Kee). Now I am hearing excuses about computers being taken away and that this Government doesn’t like football…doesn’t like cricket. I am not trying to get into any argument. I am just trying to treat everyone the same. My concern is the promises being broken. I gave them a final deadline. I sent them a correspondence on Monday and I expect everything to come to a resolution.”
The minister expressed frustration that the casualties at the end of the day were the athletes, while staff at the TTFA, including its general secretary Sheldon Phillip, was still getting their salaries.
“But when you look at the TTFA, look at the mere fact that coaches aren’t being paid. That can’t be right! These things have to stop! At the end of the day it is affecting the performance of our athletes. This Government and previous government spent a lot of money in sport and we are not getting the results we should get,” said Sancho.