Mensah rips into 'immoral' Afcon proposal
by Gary Al-Smith 21 November 2012, 15:58
Herbert Mensah, a former influential name in Ghanaian football circles, has expressed grim misgivings about the Ghana FA's proposed budget for AFCON 2013. He called the scheme "immoral".
The $8 million dollar amount, largely condemned by the local media, will allow the same amounts of winning bonuses to be given to management members and players. Mensah drew on his own experience as former Kotoko CEO to illustrate his point.
"I believe that, there should be a different set of motivational targets for management members which must deal with productivity of the pitch and deal with bringing in sponsorship for the game," he advised, speaking on Joy FM in Accra.
The businessman also lamented that the proposal is not in the best interest of Ghana. "For me to take money as part of a winning bonus structure from the playing body when the rest of the game is been mismanaged, I think is immoral. I have run football before and I never took winning bonus."
Ghana want to end a thirty-year wait for a Nations Cup trophy when the tournament starts in January. The Ghana FA have asked $6.66 million for the tournament proper, and over a million dollars for the pre-tournament camping in the UAE.
"When I was at Kotoko, I prevented every management member from taking winning bonuses as players. I was very clear that the playing body are the playing body and they need to be motivated and looked after especially when you don’t have unlimited funding. And in the case of Ghana football, not enough is being done for the game in general."
Mensah was bewildered at the logic of paying management members not based on productivity but simply by appearance. "Why don’t you set the parameters of operation such that the targets of managers is based on productivity?"
Herbert Mensah is the son of the wealthy businessman, B. A Mensah and is active in the business side of politics and football around Africa.
