CFA/TFA election votes in limbo

On Tues­day, Guardian Me­dia Sports learnt that mem­ber clubs from both Re­gion­al As­so­ci­a­tions are set to chal­lenge an al­leged un­con­sti­tu­tion­al elec­tion of the del­e­gates that will be vot­ing for ei­ther the Unit­ed TTFA, the Richard Fer­gu­son slate or in­cum­bent David John-Williams and his team on Sun­day.

The con­sti­tu­tion of the as­so­ci­a­tions, which is aligned to the TTFA con­sti­tu­tion, does not give a clear di­rec­tive of how del­e­gates are to be cho­sen.

How­ev­er, Clynt Tay­lor, the CFA's gen­er­al sec­re­tary be­lieves the gen­er­al mem­ber­ship of the as­so­ci­a­tion should be used to de­cide on the del­e­gates, as have been done in the past.

Tay­lor, who con­test­ed the last TTFA elec­tion and fell just short of John-Williams in the race for the pres­i­dent's po­si­tion in 2015, made it clear, how­ev­er, his for­mer boss and cur­rent CFA pres­i­dent Shymdeo Go­sine is guilty of a breach of the con­sti­tu­tion by en­gag­ing in the elec­tion of del­e­gates in the cen­tral zone.

Tay­lor re­ferred to Ar­ti­cle 37(3) of the con­sti­tu­tion which states - "Any Mem­ber of the Board of Di­rec­tors must with­draw from the de­bate and from de­cid­ing if there is any risk or pos­si­bil­i­ty of a con­flict of in­ter­ests."

Tay­lor and a mem­ber of a TFA club said the on­ly thing that can hap­pen Sun­day is for the votes of the two as­so­ci­a­tions be con­sid­ered null and void, or the process used by the CFA/TFA mem­bers in the past, to be ac­cept­ed.

It is un­der­stood the CFA boss, on No­vem­ber 14 called a se­cret Board Meet­ing and elect­ed Gre­go­ry Mc Sween (Harlem Strik­ers), Al­lan Lo­gan (Re­al Cen­tral) and Wil­fred Ed­wards (Ref­er­ee) as their del­e­gates, a de­ci­sion that didn't go down to well with oth­er mem­ber clubs.

The clubs are sched­uled to meet among it­self to­mor­row to de­cide on a course of ac­tion to over­turn the choice of del­e­gates. Mc Sween, con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, said no one ob­ject­ed to the vote when the meet­ing took place.

An­tho­ny Moore, the TFA pres­i­dent has been ac­cused of breach­ing the same Ar­ti­cle 37(3) of the con­sti­tu­tion to se­cure votes for the John-Williams team which in­cludes him­self as vice pres­i­dent, John-Williams (pres­i­dent), Col­in Par­tap (vice pres­i­dent) and Sel­by Browne, an­oth­er vice pres­i­dent.

How­ev­er, Moore made it clear that clubs do not have any pow­er to elect del­e­gates, not­ing "If they want to, there must be a change in the con­sti­tu­tion for it to hap­pen."

He point­ed to Ar­ti­cle 79 of the TTFA con­sti­tu­tion which gives ul­ti­mate pow­er to the Board.

The Board of the TFA com­pris­es the pres­i­dent, three vice pres­i­dents and as many or­di­nary mem­bers. The del­e­gates cho­sen are vice pres­i­dents Denise Win­ches­ter and Samuel Orr and Board mem­bers Natasha Fran­cis and Hay­den Duke, who will be the al­ter­na­tive.

Moore said, as far as he is con­cerned the process used to chose the del­e­gates was above board and con­sti­tu­tion­al. "If the gen­er­al mem­ber­ship wants to chal­lenge the process, it can do so. There is a de­lib­er­ate at­tempt by the elite clubs to con­fuse those who do not know bet­ter, for the sake of a group of peo­ple who are promis­ing good­ies."

He said as some­one who has been in­volved in To­ba­go foot­ball for many years, he is aware that promis­es that can­not be achieved, are be­ing made. To­ba­go clubs are set to present a let­ter with their con­cerns on Sun­day.

SOURCE: T&T Guardian