Sports Minister Anil Roberts is apparently trying to settle a grudge with taxpayers’ money after the Ministry allegedly agreed to fund the Trinidad and Tobago national senior football team’s Caribbean Cup campaign on one condition.
The Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation’s (TTFF) marketing manager Anthony Harford must not be involved.
At 10.30 am today, the TTFF executive committee met with Ministry of Sport Permanent Secretary Ashwin Creed and settled on the budget needed to send the “Soca Warriors” to St Kitts and Nevis next week for its first Caribbean Cup qualifying round.
However, Wired868 was reliably informed that a key factor was that the Sport Ministry no longer wished to work with Harford, who is also a director at All Sport Promotion. This was allegedly further implied in a letter from the Sport Ministry.
The local football body needed $423,218 for airfare, match fees, per diem and a pre-competition team bonding session at the Cascadia Hotel. However, it raised just $7,000 this week from well-wishers and had no guarantee of making up the difference while the TTFF faced the possibility of sanctions from the Caribbean Football Union (CFU) and FIFA if it forfeited.
The Sport Ministry’s late assistance means the national football team will take up its place in the Caribbean Football Union (CFU) tournament that serves as a qualifying competition for the 2013 CONCACAF Gold Cup.
In Parliament today, Roberts suggested that suspicious bookkeeping and a conflict of interest by Harford was behind the Sport Ministry’s tardiness in funding the national team.
Roberts claimed that Harford failed to account for roughly half of $11 million provided for the shortlived 2014 World Cup campaign.
“When Mr Harford presented to the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Sport, who is the accounting officer, the account of the 11 million dollars (spent),” said Roberts. “There were some discrepancies and (a) lack of information.”
In fact, Harford had countered Roberts’ accusation weeks ago while appearing on i95.5 with radio presenter Andre Baptiste and Wired868 also wrote about the differing figures.
The Sport Ministry faxed Harford, on 12 September 2012, detailing its concerns and, a week later, the All Sport director advised Creed that the Ministry was referring to an interim statement done on 31 October 2011. Harford claimed that a final statement of expenses was delivered to the Sport Ministry on 16 January 2012, which gave the missing information.
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