WILLIAM Wallace, the ousted president of the TTFA (TT Football Association), is not fazed by statements made towards him, in a letter issued on Monday by Robert Hadad, chairman of the TTFA normalisation committee.
Wallace and his former executive (vice-presidents Clynt Taylor, Susan Joseph-Warrick and Joseph Sam Phillip) are currently challenging FIFA’s decision to remove them, in March, and install a normalisation committee.
On August 13, Justice Carol Gobin, in the Port of Spain High Court, ruled that the matter involving Wallace and the United TTFA team, and FIFA, can be heard at the High Court and not the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
Hadad, in his email to Wallace, referred to Wallace’s letter to FIFA president Gianni Infantino on August 26, in which Wallace wrote, “Normalisation is a draconian and unfair act which seeks to undermine the independence of the TTFA and ride roughshod over the will of the electorate who voted for the United TTFA slate (in the TTFA elections) in November.”
Describing Wallace’s letter as “a complete misinterpretation of the facts”, Hadad wrote, “Wallace voluntarily chose not to make a case within the FIFA system and put forward his position. However, he withdrew the matter from CAS.”
When contacted on Tuesday, Wallace said, “I saw the letter. I just went through it. I have not formed any opinion of it. I prefer to not even respond to that.”
Asked if his focus is, instead, on the legal matter with FIFA, Wallace replied, “Yes. There is nothing there (with Hadad’s letter) for me to respond to.”
Hadad, in his letter, claimed that the tone and the content of Wallace’s letter was offensive, not only to the normalisation committee but to the people of T&T. The normalisation committee head mentioned that T&T players, membership and stakeholders requested that Wallace do the right thing and put T&T football first.
Wallace, regarding “the tone and content” of the letter, noted, “That’s Mr Hadad’s opinion. He’s entitled to that.”
About the request that he “do the right thing”, Wallace said, “The right thing is very subjective. What is the right thing? That’s a matter of perspective. That is right for some people and, for others, it’s not the right thing. We have some time on our hands and we’ll see how things progress.”