The Beautiful Game of Football Must Not Only be Owned By An Elite
11 May 2016, 14:07A dialogue of fixing South African football is urgently needed.
Never again must football loving people allow only those authorized with running the people's game to do as they wish.
Today, our beloved Bafana Bafana have to climb mountains if they hope to reach the prestigious AFCON 2017 next year.
With now three points in their group, Bafana Bafana face the prospect of again missing out in the continent's biggest show piece.
They would have to win all their remaining games to stand any chance of progressing to the AFCON 2017.
It has long become clear that the current South African Football Association (SAFA) lacks the vision to make Bafana Bafana the best in Africa and the world again.
SAFA does not know how to turn a 'Vision' into a 'Mission'. The VISION 2022 programme is a case in point.
It won't be surprising to hear that most of the football structures have not been work-shopped on Vision 2022, let alone if they have heard of the programme.
Its a regular dilemma in South African football, for its structures, not to be tuned as to what the mother body SAFA is doing, or not doing for that matter.
The 1996 AFCON winning nation; and silver medalist in AFCON 1998, a bronze in 2000 and the Afro-Asian Cup winners in 1999, Bafana Bafana are No. 17 in Africa.
In addition, Bafana Bafana, the Nation's pride and most followed national team, were honoured by FIFA, with the FIFA Best Mover of the Year Award, signalling that South Africa was the best footballing country in the world in 1996.
What could have gone so wrong that today South Africa would be ranked 72 in the world from once being No. 16 and top spot in Africa?
The answer clearly lies with the structure that Safa is running.
By the way, the football system currently formed, it is run from a top-down approach and is led and managed by only the well connected in South African soccer circles.
The thousands of soccer players and brains that have gone to waste over the decades count for nothing in football.
Whether they can make a contribution or not is irrelevant to the South Africa footballing 'gods'.
Most media groups have been useless in allowing dialogues on football to take place.
SAFA uses the Local Football Associations (LFA) which are covered under 52 districts.
If you are not involved with with one of clubs that are in the LFAs district, then you can't really have any say or influence in football.
Those communities outside the 52 SAFA districts, are powerless and made to look irrelevant when it comes to football matters.
The real challenge facing South African football though, is disunity of all the football structures and stakeholders.
Take the example of the schools soccer body, the South African Schools Football Association (SASFA), has for sometime refused to be in-cooperated to SAFA, although now it is reaching out to SAFA .
Here, SA football fraternity has been mostly left in the dark as to the politics behind the shenanigans in SASFA and South African football generally.
With no forums available for those passionate about developing the game, football further becomes something of the few and controlled poorly by the elites.
There time has come for all those who want to fix South African football to raise their hands and be counted.
They need to be visible and vocal in the media, sport councils, facility management committees, sport directorates in all three spheres of government and anywhere else, where they can make a positive impact.
For how long will we watch while South African football and our beloved Bafana Bafana ruined by those who claim to have the football's best interests at heart?
The focus point now must be the total unification of all football structures in South Africa.
Perhaps only then we will be in position to truly transform the management and ownership of football from the few elites to all those who deserve to be running football in South Africa.
Other codes should also seek to have such dialogues -if they don't have them already - as sport particularly football, has done a lot to unite people in the country more than other sectors.
In the words of Nelson Mandela: “Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire. It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language they understand. Sport can create hope where once there was only despair. It is more powerful than government in breaking down racial barriers.”